


Après moi, le déluge

by melforbes



Category: Hannibal (TV), The Fall (TV 2013)
Genre: because some of us hate our own titles apparently, otherwise known as the stedelia au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-07
Updated: 2019-03-01
Packaged: 2019-05-03 17:23:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 24
Words: 105,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14573868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/melforbes/pseuds/melforbes
Summary: Estranged since girlhood because of the divide between their parents, Stella and Bedelia are forced to confront their histories and their wants for the future as their mother’s health declines. Set before the events of Hannibal and after the events of The Fall.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> I had been doing a running list of content warnings on my blog, but I think in general that this is a piece of material that is potentially triggering in a variety of ways beyond just chapter-by-chapter thematic material. Themes of psychological abuse are present throughout this, with major plot points centering on physical abuse, sexual assault, miscarriage, and death. There are also mentions and in-depth descriptions of self-harm. Though I realize that the source material for this isn't light, there are nonetheless themes in this that are less present in the source material and that may make this hard to read.
> 
> If any of these topics throw up red flags for you, I strongly suggest clicking away.

"We assume that others show their love in the same way that we do

and if they don’t follow that equation, we worry that the love is not there."

\- Amy Przeworski, _The Love in Chicken Broth_

 

"Hiding in the doorways

Between her grief and mine, I apply her foundation

To my face. I conceal the parts of me she conceals."

\- Paul Tran, 'Elegy with My Mother's Lipstick'

 

* * *

"I'm sorry," Reed said on the other end of the line. "Something's come up. I have to go."

In bed, Stella tensed, felt her grip on her phone grow tighter.

"What's happened?" Stella asked softly, trying to keep from assuming the worst.

It was the case, she presumed, and the memories, and seeing Spector's dead body with a bag around his head, and having Olivia ask for a hug, and frightening as Jim stood behind her in Annie Brawley's bathroom. The case had thrown her off, forcing her into fearful spirals she needed to reteach her brain to overcome, for when she thought of the case, she found it easy to reach for the dusty wine bottles on her counter, for the prescriptions in her cabinet that she would never claim to have kept. She couldn't unpack her suitcases yet because the wounds were raw, still healing, maybe a week from being ready for their stitches to be removed.

But she'd had her own stitches taken out, the scar above her brow impossible to see, and she'd called Reed to tell her so. Or, rather, Reed had texted the day Stella left Belfast that she wished she could have had a chance to say goodbye, and Stella had decided to wait a day, then two, then until her stitches came out to respond. Of course, she didn't blame Reed for being distant; after Rose's recovery, Reed had removed herself from the case for fear of personal bias, and in the end, all Stella and Reed had had was work camaraderie, a solidarity formed by any two women who, while surrounded by incompetent and pitiful men, would bond over their shared womanhood and practically nothing else. When Stella had been in hospital overnight, she had answered Reed's concerned message, talk of the attack spreading through the police force as quickly as Stella had expected it would, but Stella had been careful to keep her response objective, medical in nature. They were never friends, so Stella hadn't bothered reaching out for a conclusion.

But she'd left her doctor's to find her home empty, the place devoid of light, her books neatly lined up on the shelves and a piece of art crooked only until she could prop it back up with one dainty finger. She had another four days until she was to return to work, and if asked, she could list off so many things to do with that time: pilates that she didn't necessarily enjoy, yoga that made her feel small, indulgent reading about men who would never exist, a chance to boil lobsters and cook steak and make the best meal of her whole year. She'd indulged a dream the day beforehand, had gone to a bookstore and picked out four new releases before heading to a quiet, dimly-lit coffee shop and ordering a decadent espresso con panna to pair with her new books; though the coffee was grand, she found herself staring out the long windows at the grey streets with their cobblestones and English folk either carrying an umbrella or giving up on the disembedded concept of rain, her mind wondering more about the stories within each person than the tales spun in her books. She found policework inspiring in that way, how she could read a file and see so little of a real person, then actually ask that person to retell; she didn't need to express herself in order to have others express themselves to her, and she could think of her younger years, back when she would duck into bathrooms at house parties and go through each thing in the medicine cabinet, looking up the prescriptions in a library encyclopedia while she nursed a hangover the next day. She could be elusive and grandiose but empty as well, and she admired the dichotomy, the symbiosis. She never had to divulge something of herself in order to hear the most human parts of others; all she needed to do was listen.

But no one would ever ask her about why she was sitting there in that cafe, drinking fairly-traded single origin because even coffee beans could leave her feeling guilty, trying to make her way through some Zadie Smith of which she currently had minimal interest. People had lost that most human ability, the curiosity, the comfort with just sitting down and inquiring. When she thought of her best and worst memories, she could remember a question from a stranger, a wonder of what was within her and what was within the person asking, a single look that showed interest beyond interest; she could remember being seen and wondering how she could walk to school, to work, to her home without ever having that feeling, strangers eyeing the ground or silently ridiculing her choice in shoe instead of asking where she was going, what her name was. And she couldn't blame them for having no interest, for she watched every day what happened to people when they connected in the wrong ways, how beatings and stabbings and murders came from the most seemingly innocent of origins. She didn't need a case to cross her desk for her to know that connection, in some ways, was just another form of suffering.

She left the coffee shop wanting more of something she couldn't have, wishing for conversation and cooler weather and a final direct deposit to hit her bank account. All of her summer tops had come out of storage, and now, her arms were fully exposed whenever she went out, an oddly intimate experience. She'd started arming the alarm systems in her home again, not ready to rely solely on locks. She'd called her therapist and left a message at eight pm on Friday, the time calculated in ways Stella wished to pretend she hadn't thought of. Save for a takeaway cheesecake, her refrigerator was empty. When friends texted to ask, she told them she was still in Belfast.

"It's nothing," Reed gave on the other end of the line. "Kid with a nightmare. I'll call you back."

And the maternal urgency led Reed to end the call there, the line clicking off while Stella loosened her grip on her phone. Staggeringly, the house was silent around her, the occasional passing taxi and the dull patter of rain on her windows acting as the only punctuation to her evening, her bed feeling too soft beneath her body. She slipped her phone into the pocket of her pajama pants, stood up slowly, felt each rib ache with the uncomfortable effort; though the bruises had gone yellow, the swelling down, she still felt uncomfortable pangs, maybe something psychosomatic, maybe just her body's way of asking her to stop. _Stop what?_ she inquired as she retreated to the hallway, walked down the dark stairs. She knew better than to expect an answer.

The kitchen was spotless and empty, and as she flicked the lights on, she leaned against the wall, looked out at how the vase of flowers acted as some kind of offering, the climax of an altar. Since she'd come home, she'd replaced the wine bottle she'd taken off of the rack, but otherwise, everything was the same as it had been before she left for Belfast, the same dishes stacked in the same cabinets, the same knives kept in the block. She'd seen an article on how minimalism was the rich's way of proving superiority, disposable and replaceable culture acting as a form of affluent identity, but her minimalism was a different kind, one with an empty refrigerator but crowded bookshelves, a sparse medicine cabinet but a plethora of skincare products, an untouched living room and guest bedroom but a dishtowel hanging haphazardly in her kitchen to prove that her appliances were ever used. Her home didn't look lived-in because, for the most part, it wasn't; instead, it was a means to an end, a place to sleep before heading somewhere else. Though she hadn't gone as far as the man who slept in his truck outside of his high-end technology company's building had, she still found herself unlocking the front door and bypassing the kitchen, the living room, in favor of her bedroom, where she could pull off the day in its many forms - clothes, makeup, emotions - and hole up until it all had to begin again. It wasn't autopilot living, but then again, it might not be _living_ at all.

In her pocket, her phone began to vibrate, so she picked up the call, leaned her open arm against the table. She let Tanya speak first.

"Sorry I left in such a rush," Reed gave, sounding settled-in and casual. "I wanted to hear about your bruises."

Stella closed her eyes, sat down at the table.

"They're mostly gone now," she gave.

"I don't believe you."

Reed's tone was light, chatty. Normal, in whatever way it could be. Her finger over the microphone, Stella took a deep, awkward breath, her ribs protesting, her stomach feeling both empty and too full.

She moved her finger away, said, "There's still pain, but I think I can exercise again."

"Give it a week," Reed said. "There's no use in injuring yourself."

"I'm not accustomed to going this long without it."

Uncomfortably, Stella paused. Was that too much? How much was she supposed to share in a conversation like this? The last time she spoke to someone and said such things, life things, she had been speaking to someone close, someone she knew she loved, someone with whom small talk was impossible. How was she supposed to talk to someone who knew of her bruises but nothing more?

"Your daughter," Stella cut in, hoping to change the subject. "Is she alright?"

"Yes, of course," Reed gave. "Just a nightmare. Needed a cuddle."

Softly, Stella nodded, thought of Elizabeth and sharing a bed with the little girl and staying up late telling secrets, whatever _secrets_ a five-year-old could possibly have, mostly things about the fairies she built houses for and the social order of her toys. While Elizabeth's parents, a pair of Stella's close friends, were in hospital with postpartum complications and a sick baby, Stella stayed with their daughter, just the two of them cozying up in the family's big farmhouse, various farmhands flitting about the property during the day but leaving the two alone at night. The little girl called her _Aunt Stella_ , liked to cuddle while watching movies, and would wake crying only to crawl over in the bed and right into Stella's nearby arms. When Stella returned home after two weeks with the girl, she hadn't been able to sleep in her big, empty bed, had opted for the narrower couch and spent her days at work trying to relieve the pain in her back.

"Doesn't help that her sister antagonizes her," Reed said. "All this talk of mummies coming for her in the night. I thought an exhibit on ancient Egypt would be an educational experience for them, but all they got out of it was nightmares."

Softly, Stella smiled.

"My sister was like that," Stella said. "She had a higher tolerance for the stuff, was more intrigued by it than anything else. Once, she followed me around the house reading _The Last Man_ aloud while I covered my ears. If Mum hadn't caught her, I think she would've gone on for hours."

"You have a sister?"

Stella froze, hand tightening around her phone. _Too much._

"I do," Stella gave, hoping to express finality.

"Are you two close?" Reed asked.

"No," Stella said, this time forcing the finality.

"Does she live in London?"

"No," Stella gave in, "she lives in the States."

"How did she end up there?"

"School, originally."

"And she decided to stay?"

"Yes," Stella said, "for reasons I'll never understand."

"It's the center of the world, where everything's happening. It must be nice to be on top."

Stella bit her lip, hopped her eyebrows, was glad Reed couldn't see her.

"Have you ever been over that way?" Reed asked. "Across the pond."

"A few times. Not recently."

"Did you like it over there?"

Stella huffed a laugh.

"Not at all."

"Because everything's backwards?"

"Because everything's too loud."

Reed hummed into the receiver, then drew quiet.

 _Maybe I owe Bedelia a call,_ Stella thought while she listened to Reed's soft, slow breaths across the line. The last time she spoke to her sister, all she'd done was inquire about a dead relative, his will, and whether or not she'd been written in. Of course, Bedelia had gotten money out of the man, a hefty sum that would look like pennies in her pocket, while Stella had been forgotten altogether. _You were never close with him,_ Stella had reminded herself, looking at her bank account and thinking of Bedelia's foreign currency, something Stella had had an exchange advantage over but still would never surpass. In the end, Stella knew that it had been a childhood flaw to take the side of the family in which almost all had died before she turned fourteen, but as she thought of her sister, of Bedelia's brash American life and of those awful graduations of hers, Stella knew that, all labels of success aside, she was better off alone. It was one thing to keep up with French lessons through year twelve, but it was another to write letters to relatives who would mock her accent, her father, her occupation, the color damage to her hair. If far-off French aunts and uncles eventually forgot Stella, saw Bedelia as an only child whose father was a means of procreation and not much else, Stella didn't mind.

Or, rather, she wanted not to mind. There was a difference between the two, an unfortunate difference, something that made her want to take a deep breath and cast those thoughts away. In mediation books, she read that saying a firm but kind _thinking_ to one's mind was the intent of sitting in prayer; she needed to let her thoughts pass by slowly, evenly, unemotionally, and when thoughts of Bedelia came up, she let them drift away, gave them a hefty push if need be. It was natural, she knew, to long for the love she'd been denied, but it felt aimless to crave such a thing in middle-age, long past when she could receive it.

In certain ways, she'd sought that love, in substances and people, in men and women, in dark alleys and rich, warm restaurants. She found a skosh in Paris in the eighties with a boy five years older, someone whose broken English was almost as charming as her own broken French, a person who could manage only few words but let those words count; later, she would read brief Descartes and think _yes, that was him, short and to the point, so wise that I could never understand a single word that he said._ And she found some of it in the man, someone now faceless and nameless to her, the one who led her to Jo; deep down in a drawer, she kept five quid that he'd given her so many years ago, her way of proving dominance. Sometimes, she found it in a glass of red wine, in a woman's lips, in a dinner of Vicodin and mashed potatoes, in an artist who painted while naked in her studio flat as Stella lazed between her sheets.

"I think I hate love," the artist - English, of course, and young enough to be most comfortable when Stella led, and new enough to such prospects that she used pinkish paints to craft a vulva on canvas while thinking such a concept was groundbreaking - said, legs folded, hair tied back in a bun.

Stella watched from the bed, a Cheshire Cat grin on her lips.

"Why's that?" she asked, entertaining the thought.

"It's evil, in the end," the girl gave with a shrug, then dipped her brush into a salmon-colored mixture. "All it does is hurt. Anything you feel passionate toward - music, drugs, people - it feels good until it doesn't. I think that's what humanity's about, cutting out the bad part. Keeping the concert, chopping off the hangover."

Sitting up in bed, Stella huffed a laugh.

"And how do you suppose we've all done that?" she asked.

With a deft, steady hand, the woman drew the luscious line of a long labia majora - _good girl,_ Stella thought - and agonized over the angle, looking down at herself for guidance.

"We put paintings in museums," the woman said. "We record songs. We put men on the covers of magazines."

"And that gets rid of the pain?" Stella asked as she stood, walked nakedly to where the artist sat.

"No, but we pretend it does," the woman said as Stella sat beside her, wrapped an arm around her back, pressed her nose into the woman's hair. It was odd, being the larger and more adept of a pairing; Stella was used to being dwarfed by a partner, vying for dominance through soft, calculated movements, so now, the scripts felt too easy. "We've adapted a bit, though. Made our way, I suppose."

"How?" Stella leaned down to suck the artist's neck.

"Better drugs." The woman inhaled sharply. "One-night stands."

"And there's no love in those?" Stella asked, reaching between the artist's legs.

"I don't know," the woman gave, meeting Stella's gaze fervently. "Do you love me?"

It was a power move, a reclamation, a lose-lose situation. Luckily, Stella was accustomed to those.

"Of course I do," she gave, then brought the woman's mouth to hers.

But she'd left that shitty paint-scented flat thinking through her years and recounting each person, each experience, each desire until she could find something called _love._ As she returned home, she found it leaving an abrasive taste in her mouth, a measured pain response telling her that something - thought it would never specify what - was bothering her. She did like mindless, aimless sex, unattached fucking that resulted in a free dinner and a fancy hotel room for the evening, a married man begging to worship her in the silence of night, a woman who never left her name or phone number leaving her scent on Stella's pillows. However, she found that society - therapists, friends, scientists, coworkers - classified women in two ways: kept or unkept. Of course, Stella was unkept, but she could remember being a girl and keeping her dollhouse shipshape, a Mummy and a Daddy - sometimes two Mummies, though the nanny often rearranged those sets while Stella wasn't looking - with two perfect little girls who shared a room, clothes, toys, and books, all set up in domestic perfection; when an aunt had been pregnant, she had let Stella and her sister flutter hands over her belly, the strange feeling of a kick making Bedelia wince and Stella fawn. Of course, she viewed herself as a feminist, not someone subscribing to the societal expectations of the patriarchy, above persisting systemic and cultural oppression, but she had wanted lasting commitment, little ones who made Christmas special, a house in two names instead of just one. There had been men and women in her life, but the ones with whom she could picture a future tended to be the same ones who angered as her work hours drew longer and her time spent at home waned. It didn't help that she lived the one-sided ways of her job during the workday and after it; no one wanted a partner whose story was private, classified, need-to-know.

Her father had loved her. Jo had loved her. Men and women since them had loved her as well, only their words of loved seemed to be more of a threat than anything else, a form of coercion; if they said it, then she needed to extend more of herself toward them, and if she didn't do that, they would leave. But was that really coercion? She didn't want to think of this anymore, for she couldn't find an example of good love, lasting love, love that she never needed to worry about. With Daddy and Jo, she didn't worry, but she didn't have either of them anymore. Had she never felt an easy love since?

"Are you there?" Reed asked, making Stella tense in surprise.

Racing, pointless thoughts. That was another sign that work or life or anything else had gotten to her. The remedy, of course, was therapy, a fuck, and either a pedicure or Bikram yoga depending on her mood, but unfortunately, all of those things were unavailable for now.

"I'm here," Stella gave quietly.

"What was your sister like?" Reed asked, the question sounding uncomfortably intimate on her lips and making Stella wonder if Reed expected her to hang up at the prospect of deeper talk.

 _Strange,_ Stella thought, _but not in the way you would think. Never guilty, but oftentimes ashamed. I could never tell which she craved more: absolute solitude or divine attention. Sometimes, I wouldn't see her for days because she hid out in her bedroom with a stack of books, the nanny bringing her dinner, Daddy knocking on her door but Bedelia never responding, and other times, she would follow Mum around like a loyal cat, just waiting for a scratch beneath the neck. I don't think she ever liked me, but I've never much understood how she liked anyone. When I was a baby, she apparently took me from my crib and left me on the floor of the room, unattended and wriggling, for the nanny to find hours later; Daddy told me that story with hilarity, but I could see in Bedelia's eyes as he spoke that she hadn't had childlike intent. She would rip the riding pants of hers that had grown too small so that I couldn't take them as hand-me-downs, but back then, we'd had enough money for that to not be given a second thought. The one time I ever heard her scream was when I took her copy of_ Black Beauty _without asking._

_I wanted to know her, but I don't think she wanted to know me. Sometimes, I wonder what it would have been like to be closer to her, how she would've reacted to certain events in my life. I think that's the nagging guilt that most have when estranged, the idealistic sense that every one of your greatest moments could've been so much greater if only that person had been there. In a certain sense, I think she would've been lovely to have at my graduations, at my wedding, at the births of the children I never had; she would even out the emotional toll, calm the overwhelm, soothe high anxiety with lowly indifference. The strangeness of her, I suppose, was in how she saw the world for what it was, culture be damned; she could see through our practices and understand our humanity in a detached way while still having exuberant emotions, deep feelings of anger, drive, passion. She was sociopathic enough to view the world academically, emotional enough to feel despite that. In situations I found challenging, she was cool and level-headed, the things I found most unexpected being the ones she knew would come. I never understood how she did that._

_Still, she did it, and I could remember the times when she stepped in, times when I could've never predicted a fallout. There was Easter, long before Daddy was sick, and I was wearing a little yellow dress, and a cousin had a handful of mud he wanted to coat it with, so Bedelia slapped his hands away and gave the day some memorable disorder. Years later, she stole the car keys of a friend of Mum's and flushed them down our toilet, and it was only after I'd made detective that I learned during an arrest that that friend was a sexual predator. The night after Daddy died, I woke from a nightmare to find her sitting at the foot of the bed and facing away from me, her hands folded on her lap. I didn't know why she was there, but I did know that, if any monsters tried to creep in, she would surely scare them away._

"I never much knew her," Stella gave. "Have you spoken to Rose Stagg recently?"

Reed took a deep breath, an unimpressed breath, and answered. 


	2. Inkblot

She ran the bath hot enough for steam to coat the bathroom mirrors, then poured in lavender salts, finding indulgence within the discomfort of a rainy day. After Pilates, she'd had two clients, and now, she was left with a few hours to herself before her sister's arrival. The guest room was made up; there were Paul Mitchell bottles that she had deemed too low-quality for her hair left in the bathroom; she'd even arranged for a spare driver in case Stella wanted time alone outside of the house. Though she wasn't a hostess by design, she knew that, given her relationship with her sister, she was going above and beyond.

Slowly, she sank into the gold-accented tub, roomy enough that she could stretch her legs, wide enough that her arms could leisurely float up and never touch the sides. Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes, tried to push her clients, her sister, her mother from her mind; in the silence of the tub, no one could find her, ask her anything, reembed her concept of time. On the caddy, she had a glass of ice wine from one of few decent bottles she had left; after Maman's incident, she hadn't bothered with shopping, and her plethora of wines seemed to diminish quickly, some old Zinfandels making her wonder what she'd been thinking upon purchasing them. Beside the glass was a bowl of cherries, no pits, a sweet indulgence. All she needed to do was breathe out, relax into the warm water, and soak.

It was strange, how she'd seen in international papers the face of an almost doppelgänger of hers, her sister but unrecognizably so. As she'd looked at the online articles, she'd needed to read Stella's name over and over again in order to concretize the concept. Her sister, a Met officer, fucking in Belfast and being blamed for the actions of men.  _ Naive little bitch, _ she'd almost let herself think despite having had such men too. Apparently, the killer had left Northern Ireland police at a near stalemate, so they brought Stella, the  _ expert, _ in, and within the month, the killer was dead under mysterious circumstances. Tracing her finger over Stella's picture in the paper, Bedelia had asked herself the inevitable question: did she do this? But she could remember Stella bringing dying birds into the house, asking Daddy what the could do, and despite the strangeness of the death, Bedelia knew that, when this man died, either Stella had been nowhere in sight, or Stella had tried to save him too.

A month after Bedelia read that news, she needed to call Stella and tell her that their mother was dying. It was kismet, how she could go two decades without seeing her sister, more than eight years since last speaking to her, and have news of her sister pop up twice within one season. Of course, Bedelia had arranged the call so that she could leave a message, the time difference in her favor; she'd had to wait until Stella's version of morning for a response. However, Bedelia wasn't the only one liable between them, for Stella's flight information had been for a flight the following morning even though there had been one sooner. If their mother died estranged from Stella, they both would be at fault.

And, of course, there was a certain lack of truth in the askance, for even though Bedelia claimed otherwise, Maman had never asked to see Stella. In fact, she'd never brought Stella up, not when the cancer had turned terminal, not when she'd been given six months. It was only once Maman was incapacitated, nurses in the house for all hours of the day, that Bedelia had begun to make true arrangements, selling her mother's unnecessary things and going through her mother's clothes while Maman slept. One of those arrangements, of course, was to allow Stella to say goodbye once Maman was no longer cognizant of it - or, at least, once she was unable to fight back and tell Stella the truth. Though Bedelia didn't feel that she owed her sister anything, she knew that Maman owed Stella more than simple ignorance. Had she been in Stella's position, she would have wanted to say goodbye.

A few days beforehand, the nurse had been drawing routine labs, something that she would take into the hospital after her shift, and suddenly, Maman's wheezes and coughs had turned to choking sounds, the nurse hastily trying to open her airway, but there was no use in searching for blockage; tumors in her lungs wouldn't be absolved by chest compressions and could only be staved by intubation, so one emergency call and a few client cancellations later, Bedelia found herself in a hospital, her mother being intubated behind closed doors, some hotheaded doctor asking her to  _ calm down _ while she detailed her mother's case to him. She had never been one for rushing, but she'd watched enough people die to know that timing was important and oftentimes vital, and while this prick slowly explained the nature of lung cancer to her, she found herself thinking of blood oxygen levels, of blue lips and of Daddy's cane and of tobacco, lots of tobacco, French women did so love tobacco. Though Bedelia knew that, for linguistic reasons that she'd overlooked during general education classes in college, there were reasons for overlaps amongst languages, she despised the way her mother would say it,  _ une cigarette. _ Shouldn't there be a different word, something more original?  _ Delia, une cigarette, s'il te plait. _ At least Daddy had had the pointless audacity to smoke a pipe instead.

At first, the appointments had been in halfway places, a flight to New York leading Bedelia back to her old lives, forcing her to sit across from someone with whom she had shared a residency while that doctor told her and her mother that the tumors were inoperable. If they tried to remove them, there wouldn't be enough lung left to breathe. A death sentence. What was that in French?  _ Tuer, mourir, _ she always confused those two.  _ Maman, c'est terminal, _ she would say, translating on behalf of her old colleague, and the man would look at the two of them, halfway immigrants who didn't quite fit in any country, and give a pitiful smile.  _ Do they have a word for cancer in your language? _ his eyes would ask, and she would glare back  _ yes, and it sounds a lot like your first name. _

Many flights later, she'd found it tedious to leave the workweek for her life, the weekends for her dying mother. There were adult homes nearby in Bethesda, mostly-independent apartments with strings to pull in case of emergency; when her mother needed oxygen, all she needed to do was ask. For years, Bedelia would drive her mother to chemotherapy, sit alongside her while Maman asked  _ ce qui joue sur cette télévision là-bas, _ and she could see the other families in the area, the ones propping parents and spouses up so that they could look out long, wide windows at the foliage below, but she never felt that way, understanding and empathetic, seeing her life as more fragile because her mother was vomiting into a pan; all she could think was that she wished she'd brought a book, something with which to occupy herself, maybe that study on incest in young women. She'd gotten behind on much of her desired reading.

Though Bedelia knew plenty about rejection, she found it hard to believe that a home for the elderly could expel someone, but nonetheless, Maman was forced out, her dependency too great for the place, and despite the many homes in the area offering greater round-the-clock care, Maman had been insistent:  _ non, avec vous, avec ma fille. _ Easily enough, Bedelia had managed to convert a guest bedroom into a sickroom of some kind, her mother's existence being reduced to a queen-sized bed and some drawers full of pajamas; nurses were scheduled so that their shift changes never disrupted Bedelia's sessions with clients, and for the most part, Maman remained horizontal, finding  _ des feuilletons sur Netflix _ far more entertaining than she had Bedelia's attempted aloud readings of  _ Le petit prince _ during chemotherapy. Until the emergency, Bedelia had figured her mother would die in what was essentially her basement. Until then, they would both have to wait.

Downstairs, the abandoned blood vials sat on the bedside-table, the bed astray, the carpet marked up by the wheels of a gurney. Her mother had been given a week to live. When the prick of a doctor had told her to get her mother's affairs in order, she'd laughed, for there weren't many affairs to get in order for a French-English-American woman whose first marriage was nonsensical and whose subsequent marriages ended in ways Bedelia wished not to remember, and  _ amis et famille _ could be explained in one word.  _ Stella. _ Upon calling her sister's old number, she'd been redirected via the police services in Belfast for reasons no one on the line would explain. She hadn't the slightest idea as to why her sister was a police officer.

But there was no need to think about things that she couldn't control. Human fragility was programmed, cell death an inevitability and even a survival strategy, the end and the beginning profoundly painful and the in-between just some dramatization intended to equate the extremes. For some doctors, the wish of their lifetimes was to be cognizant of their deaths, to experience it firsthand so that they could truly understand their life's work, but when she thought of death, she thought of something like this, a sweet cherry washed down with sweeter wine that would make her belly feel heavy and warm, her heart rate slow beneath warm water, the bathroom's mirrors steaming to the point that she couldn't see her own reflection. She forced her mind to slow, counted a breath, then two, then three. It was pointless to think about the past and the coming days, for she was above small worries, above the human element of biological demise; what would happen would happen, and she could imagine Stella's visceral reaction, a reprise of Daddy's death, discomfort and tears and hatred, but never prevent it. The one constant within her current life was that her mother would die; she dared not fuss with variables.

Sipping wine, she curled her toes beneath the water; if she had time, she planned to paint them a pale pink, noticeable but effervescent, not a full pedicure and massage but she would manage. In the meantime, she could set her glass down, lounge back until the nape of her neck felt the warm touch of the water, and snake a hand between her legs, her elbow covering one of the scars on her belly and the other mark left exposed. Though she'd never enjoyed doing such a thing in the bath - she preferred something beyond hands, something less tactile and more effortless, and she thought waterproof vibrators were for the more boring of the so-called  _ adventurous _ heterosexual types - she indulged the sensation nonetheless, natural oxytocin and dopamine better than whatever was left in her cabinets. After all,  _ la petite mort _ was French she had always been able to enjoy.

* * *

 

Ten people deep in an airport Starbucks line, Stella dialed Reed, tried not to think of the international calling fees.

"Hey, we're just about to read a story before bedtime, so I'll have to make this short," Reed said.

In the background, Stella could hear a bathroom sink running, two little girls laughing, the sounds of a home. The woman in front of her in line was asking a friend if she should make her caramel macchiato skinny or not because, after all, it was Bikini Season, but then again, once you're  _ in _ bikini season, like, you can't really do anything about that, right? Like, you  _ have _ to do all of the work in the winter, so it doesn't really matter if you start in June. The older man at the head of the line simply ordered coffee with milk and was prompted with  _ which kind, _ a question that would undoubtably take ten minutes to answer.

"How was your flight?" Reed asked.

"Good," Stella gave.

It had felt too early for alcohol when the snack cart came around, so Stella had opted for ginger ale instead, looking out the window and watching the laps of distant waves as she sipped. Though she knew the statistical improbability of a crash, she wondered if anyone would survive a transatlantic flight going down, wildlife and water and tides put up against the human body. It was strange, how hazardous the world could be, how people holed themselves up in homes in an attempt to be as far from such waves as possible. Had isolation really been so helpful?

"Seen your sister yet?" Reed asked.

"No, I just got in," Stella said. "Went straight for the coffee line."

"American Starbucks?"

Someone ordered a venti frapuccino. The barista grimaced.

"Unfortunately," Stella gave.

"Good luck keeping your figure."

Stella smirked.

"And just what do you know about my figure?"

On the other end of the line, Reed laughed, and Stella found herself taking a hand from the top of her luggage to her face, almost trying to hide a sheepish smile. She liked making Reed laugh.

"Oh, speaking of," Stella said, "how was the zoo?"

"Surprisingly pleasant," Reed gave.

"Oh?"

Reed sighed, said, "He's been sober more than a month. Overcompensating, I think, not that the girls see it. So long as they're happy to see their Daddy, I'll consider it a success."

"Has he been keeping up with his meetings?"

"Every single one."

Reed paused.

"I think he's trying to...I don't know. Get me back, I suppose. I say the word  _ divorce, _ and suddenly, he's on board with the meetings. I'm not sure if it's good, having that kind of illusion in place."

As Stella came up next in line, she damped her phone against her shoulder, looked blankly up at the menu -  _ shit, I forgot to call the bank _ \- and tried to remember what was equal parts caffeinated, satiating, nutritionally sound, and low in sugar.  _ None of it, _ she scoffed as the girls behind her in line grew restless. A flat white sounded better than a cappuccino, dry coffee seeming too dull for the afternoon. Thankfully, her card went through without a problem, a five-dollar drink across the pond not batting a single financial eyelash.

"Sorry," Stella said as she pulled her suitcase to the pickup area. "You were talking about your husband."

"Yes," Reed said, elongating the end of the word. "Would it be wrong of me, to say I'm not interested?"

"Are you uninterested?"

The question was supposed to be offhanded, but Stella found herself uncomfortable at the prospect of an answer.  _ It's because you don't want her to go back to a drunk, _ she told herself though she knew well enough that her fears were far more selfish in nature.

"No, of course not," Reed gave. "He asked too much of me in ways that only made me upset. I moved to Belfast for him, but still, nothing I could do would ever be enough. I'm not about to say that we couldn't save it, and I know we could if we put in enough work, but I don't want to save it. I just want my girls to have a father. Beyond that, I don't need him as a partner. As a parent, yes, but not as a partner."

"You could tell him that," Stella offered, advice coming from an improper source.

"But if it makes him lose motivation, is that my fault?"

"It's his sobriety, not yours."

"Yes, but being individualistic doesn't help my girls."

"Does it?"

Stella's drink came up, an uncomfortable American accent offering her  _ cahfee _ . Taking the cup, she said, "I have to go. I think the driver's waiting."

" _ Driver? _ "

"I doubt my sister has a car."

"That's mad," Reed said, astonished. "Everyone in America has a car."

"With our upbringing, I'm not sure she would want to drive."

"No lessons as teenagers?"

"Wrong side of the road."

"How long has she been a citizen?"

"I'm not sure," Stella gave. "She came over at fourteen, for what that's worth."

"And you think she doesn't have a driving license."

"She did send her driver to pick me up," Stella gave.

"How impersonal," Reed said. "What's the time difference? Six hours?"

"Five, I believe," Stella said.

"Can I call you in the morning?" Reed asked. "Your morning, my afternoon."

"Yeah, I'd appreciate that."

"Okay. Goodnight."

Stella half-smirked, midday light all around her but her body feeling ready to curl up in bed. It sounded nice, the way Reed's daughters laughed in the background and asked for a story, but instead, Stella had more hours within her day, an upcoming drive to wherever her sister was living and trip to a hospital she didn't want to see. Though she knew the cost of a small domestic life, the openness and vulnerability and humility, she pushed those things away for the moment, wondered what it would be like to sit down with Reed and her daughters for a story. According to little Elizabeth, Stella told a  _ good _ story because she did all of the voices right, giving the wolf posing as a grandmother a deep, hostile voice while making Little Red Riding Hood sound angelic. There was nothing quite like having a child feel safe with her, and though at this point in her life, she'd managed to make peace with never becoming a mother, life nonetheless felt lonelier without kids in the house, without someone to come home to. Elizabeth's parents had a delicate dance of life, a horse farm and two little ones and comfortable love filling their days, and sometimes, Stella would watch them struggle, see them call upon neighbors for aid when things went awry, and other times, she would be holding their new baby while the couple kissed offhandedly and casually over dinner, and then, it felt as though the strife could be worthwhile.

_ But it's not, _ she firmly reminded herself, for she knew what happened whenever she grew attached. Her empty home may make for a violent safe haven, but it was still a save haven nonetheless. With her hours, her lifestyle, and her self, there wasn't room for another person, and it had been long ago proven to her that motherhood was out of reach for proper reasons. She was intended to be alone; any rebellion from that intention only resulted in more pain, yet, of course, she still strayed back to those utopian, unreachable thoughts.

"Goodnight," Stella gave, then hastily hung up.

The calls with Reed had grown in frequency, the first after her stitches had come out acting as a catalyst toward further contact. The next day, Reed had called to make sure Stella wouldn't swim for a while, and the day after that, Stella had found some excuse that she couldn't remember to merit a chat. By the time Stella was back at work, she'd fallen into the habit of calling on her trip home, listening to Reed talk about autopsies and schooldays, divorces and uncomfortable meetings with her in-laws. Though Reed was clearly more forthcoming, she didn't mind that Stella kept quiet, rendered her days into three-word sentences that showed discomfort toward further askance. Usually, people would ask, so Stella would grow uncomfortable, and things would fizzle, but now, she could just listen. When Reed did ask, Stella would take a deep breath and be brief, but at least she could force out  _ brief. _ She couldn't remember when she had last managed  _ brief. _

But the trip across the pond hadn't been a brief detail, a weekend plan; it had been a purposeful disclosure. She had told someone that she was going on vacation, and though the word  _ vacation _ was technically false, she had nonetheless had someone to tell of travel plans. Usually, friends would only realize she was out of London or even the country when they asked to get together and, of course, found her unavailable. For once, she had someone to tell.

"You're seeing your sister?" Reed had said, Stella hearing the delight in her voice.

"Yes," Stella had given, trying to force joviality, edging around the truth of the matter. "I'm heading out to Washington. Or that area, I suppose."

"I thought you were estranged," Reed had said. " _ Very _ estranged."

"We were," Stella had said.

"I'm glad you're going. How long will you be there?"

"A week." She hadn't booked a return ticket, not knowing the dates.

"Might as well stay on England time."

Stella had huffed a laugh.

"Yeah, might as well."

When she left the airport and found her way into the arrivals pickup, she was gusted with hot, humid wind, June weather uncomfortable and alarmingly sunny. Parked close by was a Mercedes with a tall, fat man standing in front of it, his formal clothes looking equal parts out-of-place and personally atypical, the electronic tablet he held displaying  _ DU MAURIER _ gracelessly. The man recognized her with ease, opened the back door for her, silently let her know that he would be the one schlepping her suitcase. Oh, and  _ schlepping _ was, in fact, the proper word. Many cars down, someone honked angrily, then shouted a curse out an open car window. The air smelled of wet paint and cigarette ash.

Sulking into the backseat of the car, she wondered if she really did look so much like her sister that the driver could recognize them both with ease. Was it the hair, the eyes?  Only Bedelia was a natural blonde, and even then, her color was ashy and dark, not a shade she would likely keep up. In the most recent picture Stella had seen of her sister, Delia had been either in medical school or in her residency, Stella didn't understand the specifics, but regardlessly, her hair had been divided between dark roots and light hair, pulled back in braids because she'd been doing some kind of messy rotation in obstetrics. Apparently, she'd opted for psychiatry instead, an odd change, but Stella, in all of her Met officer glory, couldn't be one to judge.

As the driver climbed into the front seat, he fretted, reached for the radio controls. Stella hadn't noticed that music had been playing.

"Sorry about that," he gave awkwardly, that uncomfortable American accent making her wince.

"No, it's alright," Stella gave. "You can leave it on if you'd like."

"It's not company policy."

Stella held a soft smile.

"I won't tell."

He huffed a laugh, conceded, turned the radio back on, let some soft country-folk play as he merged for the highway. Though the windows were dark, Stella could still see the city's outlines, the departures from an airport named after an evil president, the traffic trying to get out of the city. Stella knew nothing about this country other than that their left lane was for overtaking, their dollar was flimsy, and their people were loud. Luckily, the driver knew enough to let her go numb, just a coffee and what was beyond the windows to keep her company.  _ This is the calm before the storm, _ she knew, the fortune before the fall, and at the thought of the coming days, she felt her pulse quicken. It had been years, decades even, since she'd had to fully deny her detachment, and now, she was unsure how to fare. At home, she could manage, but this was foreign land. She didn't know the protocol here for panic attacks in public bathrooms.

_ Maybe there'll be a pool you can go to, _ she thought wistfully as the driver exited the highway. Bedelia had been on a swim team once. Maybe they could even go together.

* * *

 

When the driver pulled up to Bedelia's home, she stared out at the car, watched as the driver took to her sister's luggage and dismissed her sister's insistances - an echo of a young Stella's  _ I can do that myself _ came to mind - while he took her bags inside. Behind him, a disgruntled but untouched Stella stood in the beginning rain, recognizable but so different, her hair shorter than before and her face older, her skin tougher and more tired. She wore a sweater and fitted slacks, her handbag and shoes matching a bleak blackness that was only contrasted by gold makeup and white cashmere. Though Stella looked ineffable as she walked toward the house, her hair all in place and her skin somehow not dull after a transatlantic flight, Bedelia watched her sister's little grimace as she swiped at her forehead; the weather was in the high sixties, and Stella was sweating.

The driver made a comfortable beeline down the stairs as though he'd done so many times beforehand while Stella followed him only to the entryway, toeing off her shoes and turning her eyes up like a little girl in a museum, the paintings just above her eye-level.

"You have a beautiful home," Stella said, then met her sister's gaze.

Though years had passed, something remained the same: Stella refused to give any moment more drama than it required while Bedelia would've measured her words and spoken in a way that honored their separation. Stella told the first thing that came to mind, then walked further into the house. 

"Thank you," Bedelia said, holding tightly to her Americanized speech. She'd heard of people whose speech changed based upon surrounding accents, of how some had different brain composition that allowed them to code-switch, so she found herself on alert listening to her sister. Even if she didn't mind her sister's voice, she still didn't want to sound like Stella. "Would you like me to show you the house?"

"The car's running."  _ Theh cah's running. _

"This way," Bedelia said, reaching out toward her sister's elbow and leading Stella into the first living room, where her notes from her last appointment still sat. "I take clients in this room, and I will tell you of their appointments in advance. I would prefer for you not to leave a mess."

But Stella walked forward, mesmerized in the way she'd always been as a child: a bit aloof, fascinated by everything, silent as a church mouse, visage neutral despite her wonderment. Walking toward the long windows, Stella stared out at the humid and hot-turned-rainy day, not like the achy ones of London but instead more lush, too green, technicolor that made Stella squint.

"The statues outside," Stella gave. "They're strange."

When she met Bedelia's gaze, they found themselves half-mirrored, laughter lines and crow's feet reflected but freckles and scars added or missing. Though their hair was styled similarly, Stella's curls were old and crunched while Bedelia's were fresh, and Stella's color was more bleached, her roots done in her bathroom rather than in a salon. Bedelia wore jewelry while Stella did not, a skirt while Stella wore pants. With a pair of heels on, Bedelia had that extra edge over her sister, forced flat-footed Stella to look up at her.

"They were here when I purchased the property," Bedelia gave.

Gently, she turned on her heels, headed in the direction of the guest rooms. A beat, then two. She took one dainty step onto the stairs, and then, she heard Stella head her way, so facing away from her sister, she smiled pettily. Some things never did change.

"I had the guest room set up for you," Bedelia said as her sister followed behind. "The middle bedroom is Maman's, the right one yours."

"Right one?" Stella asked.

"There are three here," Bedelia said, stepping in front of Maman's room and motioning to the rightmost bedroom. "Two on the opposite side."

The driver ducked out of Stella's to-be bedroom, nodded to both of them before passing by and heading back toward the car. Astonished, Stella looked around at the ground floor, the many doors and pieces of art overwhelming in a way Bedelia would never understand.

"Would you like a moment to freshen up?" Bedelia asked.

Stella stared at her uncomfortably, the small talk thickening the air between them and making it seem harder to breathe.

"Yes," Stella gave.

Softly, Bedelia nodded, then gave, "We'll leave whenever you're ready."

At that, Stella ducked into her strange bedroom in this strange house, closed the door while her sister headed upstairs. The bed looked comfortable, a queen done up in white linens, the bedside table holding only a potted orchid and an ornate lamp; calling the bedroom a single bedroom was misleading, for the room was twice the size of Stella's bedroom at home, a wide arched doorway differentiating where the bed went from where the armoire and closet were. Though she had to share a bathroom with the bedroom next door, she hardly felt that was a demerit.

Her suitcase, left alongside the armoire, deserved to be unpacked, so she unlocked it, pulled at the tired zipper, went through her same motions as always. First, toiletries. Those bags went on the armoire, skincare and makeup separated, face wipes left on the bedside table. As for clothes, the nicer things were hung in the closet alongside bagged dresses of Bedelia's, each offering a title of  _ Neiman Marcus _ or  _ Barneys _ upon its black cloth; the casual wear went in the dresser-drawers, a pair of pajamas left on top of the armoire for whenever she could finally sleep. She'd brought one book and left the novel, her uncomfortably new journal, and her customary alarm clock on the bedside table. Staring at the bed, she rested her hands on her hips, tried and failed to imagine her sister freshening linens.

On any given weekday, this was where her sister took clients, and the dress Bedelia had been wearing - made from dark purple cloth, modestly cut and suitable for work but also holding a sultry undercurrent from the way it clung to her hips, showing vague wisps of lace beneath - likely cost more than Stella's cashmere had; Stella didn't want to know how expensive the house was, the amount Bedelia charged her readily-paying clients per hour. Even a quick online search could explain that her sister had more than social status, an educated air and a long list of stunning awards being put to her name. Bedelia had become a  _ person _ in their time apart, more than a medical resident in braids, more than a sister whose most valued possession was a book about horses. It was odd, however, that this big house was so empty, bedrooms unoccupied and gardens well-kept; Stella would have expected a husband, some detached type who worked in the city and fucked other girls before coming home from his firm, and a housekeeper. Then again, this new presentation of her sister seemed less apt to offer herself to such a person, and she couldn't imagine Bedelia paying someone else to poke through her things.

So. Stella went into the closet, found a silk tank and lighter sweater, wore the same pants but shed the sweaty cashmere. Every time she'd been to the States, she'd been sweaty, Delia's graduations all uncomfortable in the heat, yet she'd still worn cashmere on the plane. Shrugging into the new sweater, she peered at herself in the armoire's mirror, thought of powdering her face but brushed the thought off.  _ She's getting to you, _ Stella told herself, and she was, her soft, well-kept skin making Stella's look blotchy by comparison, her dress making Stella feel uncomfortably masculine. They both had always known which of them was the more beautiful sister. 

Softly, Stella stepped out of the bedroom, but before she could head for the stairs, she stopped short, looked out a window to see the strangest of sights: there was an indoor pool attached to the house, floor-to-ceiling windows surrounding the blue-tinted water, and after trying two wrong doors, Stella finally managed to find her way to the pool. Beneath her bare feet, the terra-cotta around the pool felt warm, the whole room humid in the way a sauna comfortingly was. Though she found herself tempted to fall in, to float on her back, to effectively disappear within her sister's large, confusing home, she dared not even dip in a toe, forced herself out of the room but left with a smile upon her lips. In the morning, she could swim. She'd packed two suits and a cap just in case, and now, she could swim, only having to wake and walk a few feet to do so. Maybe there was some allure in living rich after all.

Returning to the stairs, she found an odd pep in her step, a quiet and bashful excitement thrumming beneath her skin; quickly, her mood faded, for as she found Bedelia lounging in the space where she took clients, Stella was brought back to the present, to death and the inevitability within the hours ahead. With murder, there was a set time, an erratic call coming to her in the night, a chance to identify Jo's body while the day beforehand's nausea finally settled; in comparison, natural death was too slow, and she didn't want to sit alongside Mum's bed until the inevitable occurred. She knew that that experience would be unpleasant for all, and if there was anything she knew about her mother and sister, it was that they greatly avoided the unpleasant.

Looking up from her color-filmed client notes, Bedelia asked, "Ready?"

Her gaze was steely, unemotional, indifferent and almost bored. Somehow, her eyes had always been brighter and bluer than Stella's. In the morning, she likely took hours simply to dress.

"Yes," Stella gave, heading to the door, toeing back on her shoes.

And, of course, the driver was out front, the car still idling, and while Bedelia shouldered her handbag, she watched Stella head out, nod to the driver, thank him for waiting. What was the point of thanking him? In America, a  _ thank you _ was a political act, a sense of gross dominance; a twenty-dollar bill slipped in while his employers couldn't see was camaraderie, not a simple phrase. Nonetheless, the driver nodded to her with a warm smile, opened the door for her. By the time he opened the opposite door for Bedelia, the smile had faded into an indifferent look, and as he shut the door, she noticed that the radio was playing. That wasn't company policy. Luckily, as he slipped into the driver's seat, he quickly turned the radio off, gave a quiet  _ sorry _ under his breath. The partition rose.

It wasn't far to the hospital, but nonetheless, Bedelia felt restless in the crowded backseat, her purse on her lap while Stella left hers on the floor of the car, her gaze stuck to her sister while Stella stared out her own window. The last time Bedelia had seen her sister, Stella had been in her early twenties, living strangely with some woman who miraculously hadn't sounded like a lover, studying anthropology and looking to become a doctor of philosophy, of all things. Bedelia hadn't been able to spot them in the audience, but she could imagine the discomfort Stella would have in sitting alongside Maman while Bedelia received her undergraduate diploma, stood confidently with the prospect of medical school on the horizon. At the time, she'd been so set on obstetrics, so confident in her abilities, and of course, medical school was notorious for killing such confidence, leaving recent graduates crumpling in hospital bathrooms and mourning people they hadn't even killed.  _ At least you can stomach looking at a dead child, _ she would tell herself.  _ You know Stella could never. _

But her sister was a police officer now, and a good one too, and she'd probably seen countless bodies, some children, some abhorrent adults, some innocent bystanders stabbed sixteen times for no good reason. Her soft sister had found untapped grit. Now, she led press conferences when others grew too emotional, and she had mishaps on national television because she couldn't be bothered to button her own blouse. She fucked around in foreign countries, or maybe foreign countries simply saw in her a false rumor that would lead to greater news revenue. Looking at her sister's crunched curls, she figured they were right.

Bedelia wasn't accustomed to having an adult sister, one with thoughts beyond childish longings, one who didn't curl into Daddy's lap while he read Steinbeck to her. Now, Stella was real, tangible, someone beyond a phone call after a familial death. Back when the towers had fallen, Stella had called, a soft desperation in her voice,  _ are you alright? _ And of course Bedelia had been fine, covering a friend's shift in the emergency room, her day going from calm to horrific in a matter of seconds; Maman had been home, far away from the atrocity, unable to understand what was being spoken on television but perfectly capable of understanding what it meant to watch a country fall apart. Had Stella looked like this then, classier than expected, hair tousled in a way that was supposed to look posh? Did she wear little jewelry because of her job or because of her personal tastes? Was the scar along her brow left behind from a past piercing? Did she try to cover up her summer freckles too, or was it never bright enough in London for her to have any? How much of their lives had remained the same, genetics and biology persisting while personal lives fell away? Somehow, she hoped there was nothing alike between them, only forceful biology that they both wished weren't true.

It wasn't that Bedelia disliked her sister but that Maman disliked the English, and Stella, sweet Stella the star, exuded the Englishness Maman despised as she sat alongside her sister. She'd been improperly dressed for the weather, but her hair seemed to stay in place despite the rainy humidity; when Stella asked the driver  _ how far _ and didn't mean in minutes, Bedelia felt the weight of cultural difference, the unsteadiness of conversions and alterations that translated the untranslatable. Though they both looked similar, had had the same upbringing and shared genetics, it was clear that they were vastly different people, two brought together only by a blood-bound burden. It was uncomfortable to sit alongside someone whose presence was dependent on something Bedelia wished she could change, like the dampness on her sleeves after walking in the rain for a few moments, like the discomfort of wearing flat shoes and feeling so much shorter than everyone else. In the mindfulness practices that she taught her patients, the ways of breathing into the unpleasant parts of life, she preached about how our fears offer us insight into our character, but the only insight she found that her sister offered was that their parents had equally fucked their children over, providing a fairytale life until a combination of illness, money, and shame corroded their story. No one wanted to hear about what happened to those with a bad ending.

For the most part, however, she was happy with her life now. She loved her home, felt challenged by her work, found herself comfortable with the way she progressed as time went on. Whenever she found an opportunity to improve her career, she took the opportunity, and she tried new foods when she could, ate at high-end restaurants alone or alone until a gentleman could spot her across the room and ask to buy her a bottle of wine. She even gardened in the summers and went to pilates five to seven times a week. Sometimes, she even ordered takeout. Even though caring for her mother had taken up much of her personal time, she still found that she had a plentiful life, a practice she wanted, day-to-day pleasures that fed her hedonism well. She'd been wise to stay in America.

Nonetheless - and she'd figured such a thing would happen - she found thoughts of Stella flooding her mind, questions about how their lives had diverged. Though she'd tried not to question it, she hadn't the slightest idea as to why her sister was in policework, and to a certain degree, she even doubted despite evidence otherwise that Stella would be competent in such a field. Had Bedelia imagined her sister's future, she'd have figured her sister would be a lawyer, a social worker, someone who worked up-close with people, and by now, she would have children, possibly be married, possibly to a woman. Instead, Stella was  _ célibataire _ , a policewoman with a hefty résumé, someone whom Northern Ireland publications loved to call a slut. Though Bedelia doubted her current life was a surprise to Stella, Stella's was a mystery to Bedelia, something she was desperate to question but equally desperate about which to be indifferent. After all, she'd hardly seen her sister since their teenage years; had she had genuine interest, she would've voiced it long ago.

When the driver left them at the entrance to the hospital, Bedelia stepped out of the car with ease, Stella with caution; without prompting her sister, Bedelia led them both in, authoritatively passed check-in booths and security desks while Stella hesitated by each one, and once they were both in an elevator, Bedelia pressed for the proper floor, then stood silently alongside her sister. In the reflection of the steel doors, they could each see blurry outlines of themselves, blonde hair and pale skin and blue eyes, blouses and dresses likely more expensive than the treatments taking place in this American hospital. They had been born to the same people for the same reasons, loved by those people for different ones, hated by others for what they could control but didn't want to change. Though Bedelia's curls were fresh, Stella's were a day old. Bedelia stood just slightly taller, making her wonder if Stella were on tiptoe.

Staring at the reflected image, Stella thought of the twins from  _ The Shining. _ Bedelia thought of outdated psychiatric inkblots, of how meaning could be pinned to much of anything so long as humans believed that something held insight. As they exited the elevator, they didn't share a word.


	3. Apgar

The waiting room outside of the Intensive Care Unit housed two families, a television playing NASCAR, a picked-over sandwich platter, and a priest flipping through a magazine. In order to enter the actual unit, a set of doors needed to be unlocked, and because the usual visiting hours had passed, Bedelia had to pick up a phone at the doors, dial in to ask for entry.

"I'm visiting du Maurier," Bedelia said, the normal authority in her voice.

And, of course, the doors clicked open, either security being lax or Bedelia's aura being heard through a telephone, so Stella placed one shaky hand on the door's knob, pressed it open slowly.

Beyond the door, the hospital felt oddly the same, the hallways heady but quiet, the nurse's station holding a muffin basket and flashbulb pictures of someone's children, and as Bedelia led Stella to the proper room, Stella found herself anxious but not rightfully so, the environment uncomfortably familiar, the subject matter too normal to make her nervous. In the past few months, she'd spent plenty of time in hospitals, sometimes to see battered women and sometimes to see serial killers and sometimes to be checked for internal bleeding; she'd grown comfortable with hospitals, so the unnerved dread, the anxiousness making her stomach turn, felt more out of place than she herself did in this foreign country.

When they came to Maman's room, a nurse flitted out of the door, tensed then breathed deeply at the sight of Bedelia. Had Stella been less uncomfortable, she would have smirked.

"She's remained stable all day," the nurse offered to Bedelia. Of course, the Queen never needed to ask; everyone around her should simply know which answer to provide. "Blood oxygen levels have been constant but haven't normalized. Just more of the same."

Bedelia gave a nod of thanks, then pressed on into the room, settling into a familiar chair at a four-foot distance from the hospital bed and on the opposite side of the ventilator, far enough away to be detached. Or, rather, she didn't _settle,_ just sat with her spine straight and her legs crossed, her hands folded on her lap. In the doorway, Stella stood, stared at her mother in bed while, out of the corner of her eye, she saw her sister set her handbag down, then take a book out of it.

She had watched people die before, officers down and near-murder victims barely hanging on as she yelled helplessly for someone to call an ambulance; however, those people had had an excitement in their eyes, a challenge, a deep-seated fear that meant that even the most strenuous recovery was more desirable than the outcome they would actually receive was. Her mother's eyes were closed - asleep, most likely, maybe given morphine, maybe given a sedative, Stella didn't really want to know which - so in a certain sense, this woman could be anyone, just another person near death, someone whose voice was unfamiliar and whose body she didn't see when she looked at her own. At some point, her mother must have stopped coloring her hair, for it held a grey hue with mossy undertones, something Stella dyed in order to suppress. Her brows must have fallen out with the chemotherapy, never growing back despite how her hair had. Though her cheeks were sunken, hollow, wrinkled and falling, she still managed to look a few years younger than....

Stella swallowed uncomfortably, then asked, her eyes down, "How old is she?"

In Stella's peripheries, Bedelia kept her eyes on the book, gave, "Seventy-five years, but she would have been seventy-six at the end of September."

Softly, Stella nodded, then looked back up at her mother. Seventy-five years old and dying the same way Daddy had, only thirty years later. At least now there was hospitalization, intubation, palliative care, more than just a cane and oxygen tanks. At least now Stella wouldn't have to relive hearing him choke to death in his study, the end of the coughing forcing her out of her bedroom and in alongside him. She could still remember the forcible way he'd looked at her, how he'd suddenly tried to breathe again and couldn't. She could remember that he'd wanted to live.

But her mother was ready, in whatever way a person could be. In a sense, her mother was already dead as Bedelia flipped a page in some novel, held her fingers across the words in the same way she always had as a girl. For some in intensive care, grave illness was a stepping stone, the platform on which to launch a political campaign, fodder for a memoir; for her mother, it was an excuse to die.

"Is hospice an option?" Stella asked, then found her cheeks going hot. _You don't want her in that horrible fucking house. You don't want to watch this happen._

"No." Bedelia turned a page, not looking up from the book.

"What about the ventilation?" Stella asked. "Does she still have brain function?"

"Yes," Bedelia gave, the conversation seeming a bore.

"So why are they using mechanical breathing?" Stella asked. "It'll only stave off the inevitable. It could do more harm than good."

At that, Bedelia looked up, met her sister's gaze in a way that made Stella shift her weight, look down at her shoes.

"It's what she wanted," Bedelia said with finality, then returned to her book.

Stella took a deep breath, let it out quietly, slowly; spotting a swiveling stool near the corner of the room, Stella grabbed the chair, wheeled it over along her mother's bedside, being cautious to keep it away from the intravenous catheters, the oxygen, the shaky and almost archaic-looking ventilator. Uncomfortably, she sat, let her handbag fall to the floor, leaned forward as if such an action would mean that she fully saw her mother, felt these last moments with the weight they required. A hospital bracelet adorned her mother's wrist, one _du Maurier_ listed who had had many other surnames throughout her life. How many husbands had it been? Six, including Daddy? How strange it was for one woman to be married off because she'd been seen as undesirable and then to marry five more times after that. It was almost funny to Stella that neither she nor Bedelia had married. Maybe their mother had done so enough to fulfill some cosmic quotient.

Reaching out, she took her mother's pale, clammy hand, one attached to intravenously fluids in a way that made Stella grimace. The top of the hand, wasn't that a place with notoriously sensitive skin? Softly, she held her mother's fingers, ran the prints of her own over that delicate skin, thin like a wrist's. With warmed bottles for babies, one was to test the temperature of the formula upon the wrist, a place where the skin was most sensitive. Wrists, bottoms of feet, those were the sensitive places, the places not to touch. She knew the feeling of having a cut by the nail on her thumb, how it hurt even to simply wash dishes. When she pinched the skin of her thighs, it never hurt as much as when she did the same with that of her wrist.

Her mother had age spots and skin the color of seaglass, the rare kind from a clear bottle. Once, Stella had tried glass, drunk from vodka she'd bought with his money; she'd broken the bottle, and the sharp end had been a relief, some form of mental clarity coming through in the shape of a scythe's edge. As she felt the glass hit her skin, dig in just enough to hurt, she'd exhaled a long-held breath. If she kept the cuts on the tops of her legs, then no one would ever see them, not anyone, because no one would ever see her like he had again. No one would ever see her naked again like he had, stripped of everything, even the hair on her body. If she never took her clothes off in front of anyone again, these marks could remain a secret, her own little outlet, something for her and her alone. _But would he have ever seen them anyway?_ she wondered as she pulled the shard through one more line, just one more, all she needed was one more because with one more, she would stop thinking of how he he pushed her down, his hand against the back of her head as he held her to the granite countertop in his home; she wouldn't remember how her feet couldn't touch the ground and how she couldn't get traction against him; she wouldn't remember the way he would press her clothes away, sometimes leaving her underwear pushed to the side and later complaining that her panties had chafed him; she wouldn't remember how she'd learned that letting him do it was the least painful way, going limp and numb from the waist down, focusing on the way the cool countertop felt against her cheek. At least now she could bleed for herself.

Stella wanted to see a scan of Mum's lungs, a confirmation; she wanted tangible evidence, the real thing, something to prove that this wasn't a fluke to get money from anyone. Would she have asked? Stella had wanted her to ask, to call and beg for forgiveness, say loving words and apologies upon apologies, and then, of course, the topic, _money,_ would appear, and Stella would laugh and deny her. Stella would hang up the phone and keep laughing. Stella would think of how revenge was violating one of the Ten Commandments and be proud of that. Stella would buy a handbag at a price near the sum about which her mother had inquired. Stella would go out to a bar, fuck a woman who liked the bag, leave the woman's home before sunrise. Stella would be triumphant. But her mother had never wanted money, and her mother had never wanted Stella, and her mother was dying, and people like that shouldn't have the privilege of dying. _Can't you see?_ she wanted to scream. _You hurt me. You hurt the both of us. You're not allowed to leave like this. Aren't you even the slightest bit sorry?_

And if her mother had called, she would've answered, and she would've felt fragile about it but offered the money anyway. Even though she'd seen through the scheme from the start, she would've felt let-down by how the loving sentiments extended to capital and nothing else. That was the hardest part, the misshapen wanting, the way that this person could always redeem herself, how this woman would always be her mother. No matter what her mother did, Stella still wanted her mother to love her, the flaw fatal but horribly human. Even after the abandonment, the man, Jo, her mother still didn't believe she should exist, but if her mother were to pull the tube from her throat, profess her love for Stella, and die immediately thereafter, Stella would forgive all of it. Stella would forgive how she'd been forced into horrible things because her mother had withheld money, and she would forgive the uncomfortable trips to Bedelia's graduations, and she would forgive how Daddy's horses had been sold before either girl could say goodbye. If her mother could say those words - maybe even if she so much as implied them - none of it would matter, not scraping her life together after Jo's death, not living off of the money of a man who hit her for pleasure, not the loneliness that seemed to follow her wherever she went, the oddness of hearing other women speak of their mothers with fondness making her feel deeply detached from all others.

But her mother wouldn't say those things. Thankfully, Stella might add. Looking at her mother's face, she saw the tiredness of the dying, the bluish lips, the tinges of sickly discoloration, the appearance of a corpse in an open casket. Jo had been cremated. Daddy had been in a closed casket for reasons Stella didn't know. Out of the corner of her eye, Stella looked to her sister, then back to their mother. They all shared the same nose.

She let go of her mother's hand, reached down for her handbag, stood up slowly. With the jet lag, her body felt anxious and sensitive, even just the lighting in the hospital making her cringe. As Stella headed for the door, Bedelia, for once, perked, furrowed her normally-creaseless brow, and asked, "Are you alright?"

"Yes," Stella gave, not looking back. "I'm going to wait outside. I'm ready to leave whenever you are."

Before her sister could respond, Stella was beyond the doorway, heading past the nurses' station, beyond the muffin basket and family pictures and doors that remained closed during the night hours. In the waiting room, an American-looking family sat, the mother in an Eeyore sweatshirt and the father in a Daytona 500 tee, and watched the home shopping network on a large television. The area smelled of vinegar and meat, as though the sandwich platter had just been taken away. In a less-occupied corner by long, dark windows, Stella sat in an uncomfortable chair, leaned her palms against her thighs, forced herself to breathe. There would be no alcohol, no overeating and no vomiting, no glass shards or razor blades or kitchen knives or even scissors in desperate moments; she would sit in this chair and try to get through the jet lag, and when Bedelia returned, they would go back to that horrible house, and Stella would fly home the next morning. There was no use in watching some old woman die.

Before she tried to settle, she pulled her phone from her bag, looked to see what time her body was supposed to feel, but as she looked at the screen, she ignored the clock in favor of two messages from Reed, both pictures. She opened the messages, her racing mind slowing at the sight of Reed holding her youngest daughter while they stood in front of a koala exhibit at the zoo. With light in her eyes, Tanya smiled at the little girl, who pointed at one of the animals up high in a eucalyptus tree. The second picture showed Reed's two girls standing in front of a tiger enclosure and smiling.

She could call Reed. If she called, Reed would pick up, and Reed wouldn't even be angry that Stella had lied about the trip. If Stella called, Reed would listen.

Not bothering calculating the time difference, she dialed, and of course, Reed picked up.

"Is everything alright?" she asked. "Or...it's not nearly as early for you."

"I'm sorry," Stella gave breathlessly. She couldn't deny how she sunk deeper into the uncomfortable chair at the sound of Reed's voice, at how she slowed her breaths and could finally center herself again.

"What's happened?" Reed asked with quiet, sleepy concern.

Swallowing hard, Stella took a deep breath while the sounds of agonized moaning from beyond the locked doors carried through.

"I just wanted to call," Stella gave finitely, her gaze falling to her lap.

"Okay," Reed said across the line.

There was a long pause while Stella chewed her dry lip, while strange little alarms ticked behind closed doors, while women with blatantly American accents talked about last night's episode of _The Bachelor_ . Someone changed the television channel to some kind of sports game, the announcer too rambunctious for the hour, the excitement of the program seeming offensive to this part of the hospital. _One down, two to go! He's got it, he's got it, oh, he's gonna score!_ Distantly, Stella could smell vomit laced with cleaning chemicals.

She took a deep breath, then asked, "How do you cope with death when you can't be detached from it?"

For an uncomfortable moment, Reed was silent.

"Well," Reed paused and trailed off, the question a surprise in the current conversation but an uncomfortable commonality in their relationship. Though their evening conversations had typically been about benign parts of their days - Reed ruled those calls with stories of her daughters while Stella gave soft answers about the bruising on her face and Pilates, just Pilates, that was all she could manage today - they'd never asked unanswerable questions. "I'm not sure I'm able to attach myself anymore. Or...I feel natural attachment. It's strange when I can watch someone die and feel nothing only because I know I can't change their circumstances. It would be different, I suppose, if I were a medical doctor, not a pathologist."

Softly, Stella nodded toward her lap. While her mother slowly choked to death, all she could do was sit and wait, and even Bedelia - especially Bedelia, in a certain sense - was ready for the inevitable; they were painstakingly, seemingly emotionlessly watching someone stop breathing for what would end up being hours, days, weeks, and though she felt shame for it, Stella nonetheless knew that what she wanted most was to go home, not to her sister's strange little house but to her own place in London, and to climb into bed for a long, uninterrupted sleep. All living things eventually die, a fact she'd known her whole life, and before, the thought of her mother's death had never made her resistant to such an idea. With her father, she'd felt the seams that held her world together come undone, but with her mother, she wanted time to simply go on in its same boring way. However, just seeing her mother had made those emotions change, an expected but nonetheless uncomfortable reaction; even after years of estrangement, she still wanted this woman, this empty woman, to love her. Even admitting that in her mind made her cringe.

"My mother is dying," Stella gave across the line, the statement dull and dry. _My car won't start,_ she could've said, or _it's late October, and my landlord has yet to turn my heat on._ "I'm sorry that I didn't say. I was...."

After an uncomfortable pause, Reed managed, "Oh."

"It's alright," Stella said, "but it's...an odd idea for me to comprehend."

"Were you close?" Reed asked.

"No, never," Stella shook off.

"If you don't feel attachment, that's perfectly normal," Reed said. "Psychologically speaking, that is."

"I know," Stella said softly. Psychology minor, first degree. Somehow, despite her knowledge in the subject, she had always felt like an anomaly, not undiagnosable but instead inhuman. Even in anthropology, she'd felt a kind of scientific detachment, as though the humans she studied included every human on the planet except herself. While she could watch others go about their lives, all conditioned responses and observational learning, she found herself lost in the order of things, unsure of what steps to take next. It felt as though everyone knew the secrets of the world while she was left to figure them out herself through embarrassing errors and uncomfortable mistakes. For her, she needed to learn that objectively she was normal; the statements of others, baseless and unscientific, meant nothing in comparison to irrefutable data. By now, she knew what was normal and what wasn't.

"I'm so sorry to hear this," Reed said.

For lack of a better statement, Stella gave, "Thank you."

"Do you want to talk about it?"

" _No,_ " Stella said immediately, as though the sheer idea were outlandish. "I just...."

 _Wanted to hear your voice,_ she mentally filled in but couldn't bring herself to say.

"Is your mother in hospital?"

"Yes."

"Are you there?"

"I am."

"Will you be leaving there tonight?"

"I'm..." Stella trailed off. "I won't be sure for a while."

"Would you mind calling me before you go to sleep, then?" Reed asked. "Or just when you can manage a moment?"

"Where you are, it's-"

"Doesn't matter," Reed said. "I'd like to hear from you again."

Stella took a deep breath, knew that, no matter how many times she refused, Reed would still insist.

"Alright," she gave.

This portion of the phone call was one Stella knew well, the time when the obligatory _I love you_ was thrown in to either emphasize the previous conversation or hopefully convince oneself that, no matter what was happening, all of the strife was somehow worthwhile, and though she rarely indulged in such a frivolity, she found the words resting in her mouth, ready to be said whenever she could manage them. _But you're not in love with her,_ she reminded herself even though that reminder had grown dry and boring, a waste of energy. Though she knew clearly that she wasn't in love with this woman, she also knew that she loved this woman, that conversing with her every day had brought deep comfort to the disarray of her life, that the mutual care was valuable, that Reed was someone she wanted to know for a long time. However, that kind of love wasn't something to indulge; that kind of love went away with ease, was something sweet for a moment but ultimately frivolous. There was no need to say anything even if she wanted to.

 _Three words,_ she taunted herself. _We're all going to die someday, and it's just three words. Three words you haven't found this close by in years._

"Call me back, alright?" Reed said with finality.

Shaken, Stella managed an _alright_ in response, and before she could say anything else, Reed ended the call.

* * *

Bedelia sat down alongside her sister's chair, kept her spine in alignment even though the chair was conducive to back problems. Checking her watch - and sighing in annoyance that she'd been forced to wear one at all - she saw the hour, well past two in the morning. Next to her, Stella slept silently, her body contorting uncomfortably into the chair but her visage unfazed. It was peculiar to see a woman who indulged in silk shirts and cashmere but knew how to sleep in an achy plastic chair.

At nineteen, Bedelia had slept in a hospital, Maman in some other part of New York while her daughter swam through a cocktail of pain medications, a new scar forming on her belly and one non-vital organ gone from her body. Though she'd told herself that it had just been a stomach ache, she'd finally managed to take a cab to a hospital, shooting pains keeping her from sitting upright in the backseat. One surgery later, she lay in bed while hazy white figures walked by, ignored her, talked about her as though she weren't there. In the morning, she'd intended to attend her lecture on family psychology. While she'd waited alone, drugs softening her mind, she'd thought about the woman who taught that class, tall and speaking with a Missouri accent and very pregnant.

"Is there anyone we can call for you, love?" a check-in nurse had asked before the surgery.

Once, after a human anatomy lecture that had left her horrified of her sex, Bedelia had asked her mother about giving birth, about the process, the emotions, the buildup and breakdown and ultimate end. She'd seen enough of human beings to understand that the process wasn't pretty or comfortable, but of all things that people denied of their biology, birth was one of few animalistic parts of life that remained socially acceptable even if they were surrounded by taboo. There was something deeply respectable about a most traumatic and life-altering experience, something that united all in their humanity; while masturbation and fornication and even some forms of surgery were quiet topics, birth was loud, resounding, and messy. There were few other things, she found, that held the rawness of birth, the notion that all ideas of social acceptability were suspended for the time being. If she wanted to talk about human beings in a truly objective way, she found she could only talk about them in birth.

Her mother hadn't known the English word for it, but Bedelia had managed enough information to find its name: scopolamine. For an uncomfortably sizable portion of human history, laboring mothers were stripped of their autonomy and then clothed in flimsy garb, tied down to a table, and put into a deep, forgetful sleep, left to wake to a soft belly and, if they were lucky, a doctor holding out a child. There was pain, and then, there wasn't.

And, at first, Bedelia had understood such a thing; given the option of forceful pain or sleep, it was clear that most would choose sleep, but further questioning and research made her cringe at how women rarely consented to such practices and often were knocked out while feeling scared and alone. Still, she thought the drug was a viable option, so why had it become so uncommon? According to her texts, the emergence of epidurals led to a decline in scopolamine, but why would anyone opt for a shot to the spine in comparison to sleep? Even if the drug led to infant distress, wouldn't some people not mind such an idea? Was denying the drug empowering? Was it vital? Was it human?

"You know," her mother had clarified with a neutral, almost bored tone, "I don't remember giving birth to you or your sister."

So Bedelia began researching the natural birthing movement, a band of women raising awareness for the injustices and medical abuse faced in birth, and as she read their stories - vast and diverse, from the experience of coming out of sedation to the feeling of hands forcing her child from her vagina to a warm tale of one woman who gave birth to all of her children in the same part of one ocean, no drugs, doctors, or midwives involved - she could see the clear injustice of doctors - always men - assaulting mothers in almost creative ways. Even though she knew the biological risks of birth, she found the process to be much safer than human beings assumed it to be; despite how humans had stopped listening to instinct, the in-the-moment awareness of birth brought people back to their animal nature, something she figured the world required more of, and though she'd tried to halt the thoughts, she even imagined herself being like these women, feeling every last pain while in her own bed and not in that of a hospital, being able to sense intrinsic patterns while bringing her child to life in outdoor sunlight. Regardless of the idea or purpose, every story and account came back to one central element, something she could qualify each excruciating pain with, something that made the drug seem worthless in comparison.

_I remember._

"No," she'd said in the hospital, her appendix wishing her dead and her pain making her double over, "there's no one you can call."

Alongside her, Stella stirred from sleep, waking gently despite the hospital sounds around them. Had Bedelia managed to sleep, a nurse coming off of her shift would've woken her, even just the sound of tired footsteps bringing her to alertness, but Stella woke slowly, squinting out at the harsh light, contorting back in once more until she could confirm that she wouldn't manage to fall asleep again. Then, she glanced to Bedelia, sighed out, "What time is it?"

"After two," Bedelia gave. "Would you like to see her a last time?"

Stella furrowed her brow. _Well, that's an up-front question._ "No, I wouldn't."

"I'll call for the driver, then."

"She doesn't want us to stay." Though the statement seemed to be a question, Stella said it with finality; though some of her sister's qualities irked Bedelia, at least Stella didn't doubt her sister's intelligence, conscientiousness, and authority.

"No, she doesn't," Bedelia said, taking her phone from her handbag.

"So this is it," Stella gave, her eyes at her sister's shoulder, a concentrated form of near-avoidance.

Bedelia didn't respond as she rang.

Softly, Stella nodded while Bedelia spoke to the driver, asked him to pull around, and once the call was over, she brought her phone back into her handbag, went to stand by the windows ahead of them. From the farthest corner, she could see down to the drop-off area in front of the hospital, where the driver always parked. In a small way, she felt bad for the man, for how he was pulling overtime for her, for how he'd heard of her sick mother and been remorseful enough to never complain about the extra shifts. _It's his job,_ she forced herself to shake off, but nonetheless, she didn't want anyone else to watch this as it happened, to bring by casseroles or to ask her how she was doing or to tell her that they understood. What she wanted was for it to be over, the ending crisp and clean, a last breath followed by silence. Then, she could bury her mother, and she could move on. The longer her mother lived, the more disheartening such a death became, and Bedelia had no desire to mourn. For Stella, she figured the sentiment was the same.

However, she thought of Maman's lonely room, of the medical equipment and the neutral nurses and the way an intensive care unit tended to be devoid of personality, of life, and she wondered if someone could bring a cot in for her, if she could spend the night there. _Why the fuck would you think that?_ one voice in her head spat, but nonetheless, she felt a deep, comfortable sense of ease at the idea, staying close by until the very end, being the one who stuck with her mother through it all. At home, she would have Stella, all boisterously emotional in the downstairs, her feelings so loud that Bedelia could feel them secondhand, and given the prospect of a neutral, human place, she preferred the one in which many were dying, the place where everything was painted so that biological waste could be washed away with ease. She'd never much liked places with history.

The driver pulled around, so she started to head for the hospital's exit, Stella groggily following at her heels. The drive home would be inevitably uncomfortable, Stella using her handbag as a makeshift pillow against the car's windows and Bedelia sitting stockily alongside her. In her own bag, Bedelia had a pair of headphones and a Vivaldi piece on her phone, but she wasn't in the mood for music.

"Can we stop for something to eat?" Stella asked as they stepped into the elevator again.

Bedelia pressed for the first floor.

"I don't know of a restaurant open so late," she gave, looking toward where the front wall of the elevator met the ceiling.

Stella huffed, "There's fast food at every fucking block. All I've had today is a coffee."

A Mercedes in a McDonald's drive-thru, a driver ordering on behalf of two women in the backseat. _Yeah, I'll have uh...a Big Mac, hold the pickles, barbecue sauce on the side. Pair that with a medium fry - wait, large, sorry, a large fry, and a Sprite. And a chocolate shake. Yeah, that'll be all. Wait, no, sorry, double the Big Mac order. Do you guys have change for a fifty?_ The picture was ridiculous, but uncomfortably, she found herself hungry as well, wanted something neutral and normal, not overtly healthy but not something to make her feel heavy in the morning. Most of all, she wanted not to cook though she doubted Stella knew how to cook or would even be willing to cook for another person. Even if she had friends to tell of her mother's illness, she doubted anyone close to her would be willing to leave in the early morning hours to cook for her, such a thing socially unacceptable and requiring a vulnerability she knew she would never voluntarily offer. Was there really no one she could call at the hour to ask for something so small?

At a revelation, Bedelia smirked. She did know someone who could cook for her.

"There's food at home," Bedelia gave even though she now knew she wouldn't be eating there.


	4. Bolero

Bedelia carried herself in an uncouth kind of languid way as the driver opened the house's front door for her, high heels so natural on her feet that she looked not to ache at all; she acted more easy-going, strangely relaxed, awake but a drunken and warm kind of drowsy. At the doorstep, Stella reached into her handbag, pulled out her wallet, gave a look of remorse to the driver.

"I'm sorry that I forgot earlier," she said, "and that I don't have any proper currency."

The driver furrowed his brow, gave, "It's not customary to tip, ma'am."

She took out ten quid and pressed it his way.

"I don't believe you," she said.

With a nod of thanks, he took the cash, motioned her inside, shut the door behind her. Somehow, it seemed as though the house had maintained the same level of light all day, afternoon shine seeming natural and nighttime candescence reminding her of candles lining an onyx bathtub. Bedelia set her purse on the kitchen table, then began her _déshabillement_ before she could even reach the master bedroom's staircase. As she took heel-clinking steps, she kept her earrings in the palm of her hand, began to unclasp her necklace. Stella had never seen her undress.

There was no _do you want to talk about it,_ no _I don't think either of us has eaten,_ no _there's food in the fridge and towels in your bathroom downstairs,_ but what was most peculiar was that Stella expected something, _anything,_ from her sister after years of estrangement. Though she could read texts on emotional trauma, spend her free time studying chronic psychological manipulation, work toward a whole second degree so that she had a greater grasp on psychology, she would still keep these people as halfway saints in her mind, family members who, if given enough opportunities, would someday love her correctly. Certain parts of the brain thought logically while others dwelled in timelessness, a sense of inner peace undefined by wisdom and woe; even if she could train her logical mind to deny these people, her illogical mind would still look at her sister and see the potential for love. And, in Bedelia's defense, Stella assumed that her sister was capable of love; Stella's logical mind simply knew better than to think that her sister would ever love Stella specifically.

In a way, life was about overcoming the biological barriers put upon mankind, a way to make all things objective and quantifiable so that confirmation bias, personal opinion, vision loss, much of anything distorting the view would never mar the human race's history. Or, rather, that was a western way of looking at things, but at this hour of the night, she couldn't be bothered to craft a thesis on the proper ways of living and on how westerners - particularly, if she were to be frank, Americans - avoided such ideas at all costs. Here, everything was objective, from calorie counts on restaurant menus to advertised gym memberships starting on the first of January to navigational systems that relied on the existence of a highway system only a few years older than Stella herself, and the notion of progress being measured by a statement with no existing statistical backing here was ridiculous. In some cultures, knowing was the highest form of wisdom, but here, sureness was monetized into oblivion while the poorest screamed for help on the most basic grounds of feeling a need. Didn't people here value feeling? In cultures like that of the United States, did anyone?

But she was generalizing, and she was exhausted, and she was anxious, and she was hungry but too exhausted and anxious to eat, and nonetheless, she imagined Bedelia's fridge to be her sister's greatest rival in Ice Queen status, chunks of liver or rabbit set aside in butcher's packaging, a pen-written price at or above forty quid - Stella couldn't remember the exchange rate - showing that this was a connected food, the kind passed from one eloquent person to another. Bedelia would never have mustard in her fridge unless that mustard was French, organic, whole, and doused in so much white wine that simply opening the jar could render someone drunk. Still, Bedelia's fridge was likely full with organic vegetables, the freshest berries that were too posh for a basic supermarket, proper cheeses in a proper cheese drawer that was set to the proper temperature; while Stella's fridge back home still held the remnants of a takeaway cheesecake and nothing else, Bedelia's fridge, in which Stella would find most things to be shockingly inedible, was full. She couldn't find something human in a full but uptight fridge.

And, again, she was exhausted, so she slid her shoes off, slumped toward the kitchen, opened three separate cabinets before finally finding some liquor. Of course, the glasses were lined up four-abreast in another cabinet, and she poured herself two fingers of high-end scotch, her aching hands leaving prints on the dust-covered bottle. She took a sip that burned, then another, then thought of when she'd last had water to drink but took another sip anyway. Though therapists would never recommend such a practice, she knew better than to try to save a certain type of day; after so many pitfalls, she found it less tiring to simply let the day go, no more water or food or sunlight or fresh air coming her way, nothing but bad decisions that she would regret enough to make her opt for better things the next day. Tonight, she was allowed the indulgence of a second two fingers, and she carried the glass in one hand, her purse over her shoulder, while she went down the stairs and into her makeshift bedroom. As she clicked the lights on, she saw the pajamas she'd left out for herself, the cleansers and creams set out so that her trip from front door to the bed would be as direct as possible. Letting out a long-held breath, she pulled at the zipper of her pants, unhooked her skin-marring brassiere, left all of her clothes in a pile on the floor while she stepped nakedly into her pajamas, the soft, the modest cotton feeling indulgent as her body ached through the time difference. She took off what little makeup she had left, then carried her purse over to the bed, set it on the left side while she climbed in on the right. Settling herself beneath the comforter, she took the bedside remote for the blinds, lowered all with the press of the button. With a separate remote, she could lower the lights, and now, the room was dark, comfortably dark, the kind of dark that meant she could still see her surroundings but never feel as though she needed to squint her eyes shut.

As she sunk into the mattress, she felt the day collapse over her, from the transatlantic flight to the many hours spent in a hospital to coming home around two in the morning with her sister, her silent sister, her sister who was always under control even when she wasn't in control. When they were girls, she remembered trying to weasel her way into Delia's - _Be_ delia's - life and how she her sister would turn up her nose like a posh little dog, insist that they shouldn't delve into Stella's favorite frivolities. The reality was that Bedelia had gained more personality from her mother and Stella from her father, and they both knew how that marriage had ended.

And Stella could remember Bedelia's high school commencement, held at that strange school in Connecticut, and even though Stella had been outcast, no longer much of a part of the family, her mother a legality and nothing more, she'd still managed to attend, had sat with her mother and her mother's new boyfriend - someone she'd never met before and had only seen once since - as Bedelia and all of the other girls walked in time to music while wearing white dresses and holding flowers. It was odd, a sort of pre-marriage ideal, an offering of barely-legal girls to whichever man decided her college degrees weren't too much of a threat. Though Stella hadn't been told about it beforehand, Bedelia had had a coming out party, something distinctly American and uncomfortably rich, and the notion of presenting a girl in white as a way to express her eligibility to marry made Stella wince. _Like a child-bride,_ she'd thought, _a rich American man's child-bride._ With too much money came corruption, but somehow, that corruption had fallen on girls, smart girls, the politicians and writers and philosophers of the future; there was something cosmically wrong with girls suffering for the greed of rich men.

And it wasn't as though Stella had never known money. No, she could remember the stables on their property in the country, all of the horses they boarded throughout the year, and she could remember being out there with Bedelia and brushing each one down, mucking the stalls with the girls Daddy had hired to help, taking the horses out for rides through all of the vast countryside that they owned. Stella had known riches, but she felt a detachment to that money, found it all to be a childish idealization of the real world; after Daddy died, the estate was sold, her mother following Bedelia to the states while Stella was left at boarding school, an offer of _you can always come to New York on vacation_ left open even though she knew well enough that neither Mum nor Bedelia wanted her to cross any oceans. And school wasn't bad, not in the least, but she did find it uncomfortable when the other girls returned from their breaks clad in new clothes and ready to learn; while they divulged stories of their trips to Amsterdam and Denmark, Stella would remember the books she'd read in the historic library on campus while snow fell outside of the creaky windows, the cup of tea she shared with Miss Harriet and her sweet cat on Christmas Eve; it wasn't bad, but Stella could see the contrast well enough to know that, after certain deaths, some children simply aren't loved anymore.

And now, this house. This new-wave octagonal hellhole with too many rooms and a fucking indoor pool. Though there was a garage, Stella highly doubted Bedelia kept anything in there other than a snowblower she hired someone else to use or perhaps a vintage convertible that she brought out once a summer, her hair tied back in a silk wrap while she drove recklessly on winding roads. Though Stella knew that doctors made fortunes in this country, she couldn't understand how her sister had amassed such wealth after a transatlantic move, a college education, a number of years supporting her unworking mother. In the end, she didn't know exactly what she _could_ understand about her sister, be it the scheme of drivers or the way she had to position her fingers in order to read a book. She doubted they could ever reach equal ground because they were simply too far apart as people and had always been.

From inside of her purse, her phone lit up, so she sighed, reached for the device, saw a single text from Reed.

_Hey, are you home yet?_

Yes, she'd promised to call, and somehow, the prospect of speaking to Reed again made her anxious, unexcited, the opposites of what she usually felt. Though their nightly calls had been the best part of her day, Stella had put in personal information, the kind that demanded questions, and she couldn't take that information back. Any conversation with Reed would require mental effort, more energy than she wanted to expend, so there was no use in responding. At this point, she usually let people go, but she felt a twinge in her gut at the concept of letting Reed go. _Isn't there something more here?_ she begged herself as if she hadn't done the same with the last few people who had made it this far.

She forced herself to call.

"Hey," Reed said, picking up.

"Hey," Stella gave back, her tone clipped.

"You must be exhausted," Reed said, a humorless laugh on her lips.

"Very."

"I don't want to keep you long," Reed gave, "but I wanted to make sure you're alright."

"I'm fine."

Another humorless laugh.

"Famous last words," Reed said.

"I don't mean to be impolite," Stella gave with a sigh, "but I've been awake for-"

"I know, I know," Reed gave. "I just...."

Closing her eyes, Stella felt the breathy silence between them, the thousands of miles of distance, the crackly, vinyl-record way that Reed sounded through the phone, and though she'd taken such calls in bed before, had excitedly asked Reed about a newer, more interesting case of hers, had inquired about show-and-tell at school, she found that she wanted to throw her phone across the room this time, add to the distance between them. She really didn't want to talk.

"You never told me about your mother," Reed said, her tone sad but not upset. "I thought this was a vacation, of all things. I feel as if I said something wrong."

Was she the kind of woman who needed such assurances? Stella put her finger over the microphone and sighed.

"You're fine," Stella gave into the phone.

"How's your sister?" Reed asked. "Have you two...I don't know, talked? Has she already made arrangements?"

"I don't know."

"Will there be a funeral?"

"My mother isn't dead yet."

"Will you-"

"I'm booking a flight home in the morning," Stella gave with finality. "I really need to sleep."

Reed paused, so Stella waited for the line to click off. They didn't have a customary _goodbye,_ and she knew her own tone was annoyed, so she wanted to let this call be bad and nothing more. Then, she could sleep, and this day would finally be over.

"Why didn't you correct me when I thought this was a vacation?"

Stella closed her eyes, didn't want to respond.

"I was...I thought you were excited about this," Reed said. "I thought you were reuniting with your sister. I thought this was supposed to be happy."

"Why would seeing my sister make me happy?"

"I don't know," Reed gave. "You didn't give me a reason to think-"

"I hate my sister, and my mother is dying, and I didn't tell you because I didn't want to," Stella forced. "I'd really like to go to sleep."

Now, Reed was silent on the other end, so Stella quickly gave, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean that."

"Yeah, well...."

Stella tried to press the button to end the call but missed.

"I thought you wanted to tell me stuff like that," Reed said. "God, I told you about my divorce. About my-"

"It's different," Stella said, feeling her heart rate grow uncomfortably fast.

"No, it's not. You know it's not."

"Tanya-"

"Even my friends don't know he's an alcoholic. They all think he cheated on me."

"I didn't mean-"

"I know that you like privacy, but it was little things. I felt like you wanted to say more. I felt like I could talk to you and, eventually, you'd come around."

Though Stella wanted to say something, to promise that she would _come around,_ she'd had this conversation enough times to know that such a thing wouldn't be true. From her silence, Reed gathered that answer.

"I'm sorry for keeping you up," Reed said, then ended the call, leaving Stella alone in the darkness with the sound of an empty line.

* * *

 

After two hours of hopeless tossing and turning, Stella reverted to the glass, finishing off what little scotch had been left. She kept the last two fingers on the kitchen table while she stared down at the Zadie Smith she'd brought, barely registering that there were words on the page at all. Usually, she kept a sleeping aid of some kind in her suitcase for instances of this sort, but she'd forgotten to refill her stock after Belfast, so now, she could only wait and hope that she would be forced into sleep before morning came.

A knock at the front door proved impossible to ignore, so Stella forced herself up, felt her bones ache with exhaustion but her body grow warm. Though she knew better than to think that alcohol could replace sleep, she preferred this feeling to the discomfort she'd found in bed, Reed's words echoing in her mind, each phrase a punch to the gut; now, at least, she was soft, languid, more comfortable in this foreign place. She opened the front door, peeked through sheepishly, saw a man holding the kind of platter that should have been on the set of a Victorian film, the plate full of food in various brown shades that somehow only made it look more rich and luxurious. Stella grimaced.

"Can I help you?" she asked, figuring this man's Armani-or-better suit and high-end car idling in the background meant that he was some haughty friend of her sister's, someone whose version of a post-funeral casserole was too refined for even Williams-Sonoma dishes and cutlery.

The man gave a challenging smile, something Stella didn't know how to interpret.

"I'm here to see Doctor du Maurier," the man said, accenting his French with a foreign tongue. Of course, even his accent made French sound better than Stella's did. "I take it that you are a relative."

Stella leaned into the jamb of the door, crossed her arms.

"She's upstairs," Stella gave, "and asleep, I'd imagine."

"She called," he gave, that strange smile still on his lips. Not quite a smile, maybe a bemused grimace. _You are too lowly for my tastes, and you are in my way._

Glancing toward the kitchen table, Stella saw her sister's handbag - Chanel, insured, the kind that was on an international registry - sitting unopened, right where she'd left it after they returned from the hospital; Bedelia had never taken her cell phone out. To the man, she gave a look of distrust, something she would have felt toward him even if he had never spoken to her.

"I'll knock," Stella gave, then shut the front door in the man's face, locked it, added in the deadbolt for good measure. Of all men, she found rich men to be the least trustworthy, and even without past experiences or statistics to back up her claim, she knew that there was something unnerving about him, something she could never overlook. Cautiously, she turned back toward the master bedroom, climbed the stairs with light, barefooted steps; she hovered her hand at the door, grimaced in anticipation, and knocked twice.

"Bedelia?"

It felt strange and foreign to have her sister's name on her lips, as though she were speaking a language that she barely understood, as though the letters in her sister's name weren't present in Stella's mother-tongue.

"There's a man at the door," Stella stammered, "for you."

With the silent pause that followed, Stella swallowed thickly, uncomfortably. Then, the door opened suddenly, so Stella stepped back, watched as Bedelia descended the stairs in a new skirt and top, along with a different pair of heels, a smaller handbag slung over her shoulder. As she walked toward the door, she ignored Stella altogether, undid the deadbolt, headed outside without another word. Flummoxed, Stella stood at the top of the staircase, heard the car set off, wondered why on earth Bedelia would bother with lipstick at such an hour. Her skirt didn't even look comfortable.

Returning to her spot in the kitchen, Stella sat down alongside her glass, eyed Bedelia's abandoned bag. She reached out for the purse, and upon opening it, she gawked at how Bedelia's wallet was still inside, brimming with cash - including euros, miraculously - and membership cards to pilates studios, spas, even a country club whose name made Stella force out a laugh. Digging deeper, Stella saw lipsticks - two Yves Saint Laurent, gold-encased - and an agenda - to keep track of her patients' appointments, Stella assumed - and colored films stuffed into a tiny notebook, along with Bedelia's cell phone. Whatever was in the bag Bedelia had left with, it surely wasn't anything substantial. _Other than another lipstick,_ Stella giggled to herself. Though she knew how ridiculous the moment was, it felt right that while their mother died in a hospital, Bedelia was going on a date at three in the morning.

And now, Stella had cash and a phone whose calls wouldn't be international, so she did an online search, pulled up a proper phone number.

"Hello," she said as the person on the other end picked up, "I'd like to order a large pizza for delivery."

* * *

 

For fifteen dollars plus an obnoxiously American tip - she'd given the delivery boy a fifty from Bedelia's abandoned wallet, wickedly delighting at how his eyes had bugged, some peculiar English woman paying his grocery bill for the rest of the month in money that had felt like a plaything in her hands - Stella had dinner, a peculiar white box atop Bedelia's ridiculous countertops. She'd uncorked an expensive red wine, filled a glass practically to the rim while her steaming, cheesy dinner awaited her, and not caring about crumbs, she forewent a plate, plucked slices directly from the box and brought them straight to her mouth, one hand feeding herself and the other balancing _beaucoup du vin_. She wondered sometimes if humans still ate like their ancestors did, and as she licked grease and crust-crumbs from each of her fingers, she decided that, whatever they'd evolved for, it had been so that she could eat this pizza in such a way, both primally and delicately. Thinking of Bedelia's liver dinner on that elaborate and small-portioned plate, she smirked. Sometimes, richness and delicacy weren't indulgent in the least.

The rain had ceased, and the house felt achingly silent, lonely and cast-out and otherworldly, so Stella stood, pizza slice in hand but wine left on the counter, and found her way to where Bedelia kept a speaker. There was a classic iPod docked, so Stella furrowed her brow; based on the rainfall showerhead and silk sheets in the guest bedroom, Stella figured everything here would be up-to-date, even frivolously so, but nonetheless, as she clicked the iPod on, she found comfort in something from a few years prior, something Bedelia had kept even if she could afford a newer model. Looking through the songs, Stella found mostly classical music, lots of Chopin and Liszt, and she scrolled past all of those, in no mood to add eerie sounds to an eerier house. Though she could understand her sister's obvious aversion to modern music, she craved something from this century or the one only a few years prior, some Annie Lennox or even Adele, but instead, she read through every European composer who ever made an upper-class Italian gasp with delight back in his - yes, _his_ \- day, until she finally found something worth playing. _Yes,_ she thought as she started playing "Bolero." _This will do._

She sat again, left her crusts on the emptier part of the pizza box. By now, she'd lost count of the slices, maybe three or four, but she took another one anyway, washed it down with the remainder of the wine in her glass. Reaching out, she refilled the glass to a centimeter from the rim, then drank more. With the time change, her body felt off, her mind in an emotionally- and physically-exhausted haze, but the wine felt good, warm and cozy, different from the sweaty humidity the States seemed to have with this weather. The song built as she took another slice of pizza, not conscious of her appetite but more than willing to eat, woodwinds and light drumming keeping time as she bit, chewed, swallowed, drank.

Her phone, cast off to the side, was silent, and thankfully so. She'd imagined that Reed would want to call her back, to say some final words, to twist the knife that was Stella's aversion to sharing personal details, but she didn't. When it came to how she'd wanted Stella to talk, Stella couldn't understand the motive. Why would she want to talk? Her mother was dying, Tanya wanted her to talk about it, and she didn't want to talk about it. Whenever a colleague died, be it in service or otherwise, her whole department would receive an email with a notification that grief counseling was available for any urgent needs, but how could people know they needed help so quickly? For her, the true reaction, the reaction that wasn't merely instinctive, the reaction that was rational and could be worked through, took days, even months, to manifest, and by the time she realized that she felt something, the time had passed, and everyone else had moved on; she didn't understand the need to dredge up old topics, to remind those around her that a tragedy of some kind had happened, be it large or small. If everyone else went on as though nothing had happened, shouldn't she?

She knew that suppression was more painful than the alternative, but as she refilled her glass, the sour, metallic taste starting to make her grimace, she figured the devil you know, you know? And it wasn't as though she spoke to others about her emotions, and she'd never liked that aspect of therapy, of admittance; she preferred the facts, dates sober and yearly salary, cancellation policies and places where she could swim. She knew how to cope, but others seemed to think she didn't, so they asked, and they pried, and her therapist tried to shift to every week and not every fortnight, and the music grew louder, the snare drum and trombone aching through their parts while the harp kept perfect time. After so long, she _knew_ what she needed, but others would still tell her to quit drinking, to reach out to someone, to call a hotline when she felt those urges again, and it drove her mad, making her want to hold out something sharp toward those who doubted her and say, _see? I could use this if I wanted to. And there's nothing you could do to stop me._ The violins began their shrill performance, shaking Bedelia's kitchen in all of its acoustic perfection. Suddenly, the room seemed too small, the speaker too loud, the house too dark but the security lights outside too bright. Stella took another sip of wine.

It wasn't really a hangover if she could force herself into Bikram the next day, downing two liters of water in the class and leaving midway through to vomit in all of her sweaty glory, the studio's bathroom's incense covering up the smell. If she could leave a one-night stand and go straight to the pool, her locker there holding a spare suit, then she was alright. The trick was to keep moving, just like in a road race; if you stopped to take a breath, you'd feel it all, so you just keep running. With her work, she didn't have time to stop running, so she went to work, went home, slept, woke up, swam, went to work, repeated that sequence until it bored or depressed her enough for some staccato burst of pleasure to feel easy and commonplace. Her best fucks were when she was angry and exhausted - four mutilated bodies in the morgue, a case with no leads starting to go cold, and someone's head was between her legs, and she didn't care about being too loud because we're all going to die eventually, right? It wasn't really a problem if she could still come.

Finishing off the glass, she went to pour more but found the bottle empty - how strange! I had been full only seconds ago. In the box, there were still two more slices of pizza, but she was full, almost too full, so she left those behind, maybe for Bedelia to eat whenever she returned. As Stella stood, she giggled at the thought, Bedelia eating delivery pizza, Bedelia eating pizza at all, Bedelia eating _carbs,_ but even one step off of her seat was too much; she found herself wobbling over to the kitchen counter, where another bottle of wine sat. Thankfully, this one was already open, so she plucked the cork gracelessly from the bottle, then eyed her glass, so far away on the counter. _Fuck it,_ she thought and brought the bottle to her lips, drinking quickly because the taste was too rough to sip anymore, wondering how anyone could bother with room-temperature wine when letting it go warm made it taste worse than the kinds that came in boxes. She forced herself to swallow as the trumpets came in, taking the piece to new heights, turning a march into a battle cry. Breathing deeply, she looked out on the house, found her vision blurring, wasn't sure she could make it back to the chair; she leaned against the counter, took another swig from the bottle.

She would've preferred whiskey, but if there was anything she knew about her sister, it was that Bedelia was rarely economical and wanted there to be meaning in her actions; having Maker's Mark in her cabinets would've been a disgrace to her image, so Stella had to suffer through too-expensive wine when everyone knows that they all taste the same in the end. So close to the speaker, she found the loudness was giving her a headache, so she stared out at her chair, seemingly so far away, and mapped her way to it, around the dining room table, past the pizza box and empty bottle, right back to where she could sit. If she got to that chair, then she would be fine. The chair was where she needed most to be. Taking a deep breath and puffing up her chest, she committed to the journey, knew she would make it back to the chair, and she most _definitely_ wouldn't fall. For good luck, she took another long drink from the bottle, wiped her mouth on the back of her hand. At a peak in the music, she took her first step.

It was shaky at first, but she eased into the trek, stepping on one foot and securing it in place as though she were rock-climbing. Step, wait, hold. The music grew louder in excitement but softer in volume as she headed around the table, finally reaching the chair. However, the chair itself posed another problem: it was high up enough that she didn't know how to get up onto it. Should she set the wine down and try to climb on? No, she couldn't hold enough strength in her arms to do that. There were some nice couches in Bedelia's living room, right where she took patients, so Stella headed that way, stepping as the Ravel piece began to swell into its ending. Because her footing had grown better, she sped up her pace, went into the living room with ease, but as the piece collapsed into silence, she tripped on the edge of the carpet and landed on the floor, the wine bottle cracking and leaving dark liquid to seep into the floors. _Fuck,_ she thought as she felt blood pooling between her toes, a glass shard stuck there; in the few heartbeats of silence, she tried to breathe, but the strange octagonal ceilings only made her feel more nauseous, more anxious. Forcibly, she closed her eyes, thought of therapy, of picturing a stop sign and analyzing the red color of its background and white of its letters, then shifting to a positive thought. What fucking positivity did she have left?

 _Elizabeth,_ she thought, and images of the little girl came through. There was the time she and Elizabeth mucked the stalls at the girl's parents' farm, the practice so warmly reminiscent of Stella's own childhood that even the smell seemed comforting. While the girl's parents, Stella's close friends, were in hospital, Stella watched the girl, had tea parties with her dollies and went on picnics with her whenever the weather cleared up. What Elizabeth liked most was building fairy houses, taking moss and bark and creating a little home with them; whenever they headed back inside, they would leave behind a village of floral dens, roofs made of leaves, sticks leaning together to make a little hut. Sometimes, Stella would tell Elizabeth about how people around the world live in dung huts or houses made of fronds, and Elizabeth would say that that was silly, so Stella would say that those people probably think the two of them live silly lives too. When the girl had a particularly bad nightmare, Stella was forced to sit up in bed, cradle her close, brush hair away from the girl's tear-stained face and whisper soft nothings into her ear; eventually, Stella resorted to singing, a quiet and shaky rendition of "You Belong to Me" filling the guest bedroom, and once the girl calmed, she said _you're a bad singer, Aunt Stella, but I love you anyway._

But that wasn't a real relationship, was it? No adult could have a real relationship with a child, not something symbiotic, but at this point in her life, she found that children were the only people whose love she felt acutely; with everyone else, she had expectations to manage, but with children, she could be exactly who she was at any time and be loved for it. Though Stella could answer adult questions, provide for herself in adult ways, she despised the expectation of emotional congruency, of being shut-down in public but intimate in the home. She liked public blow-ups, escorting a child away from the action until they could calm down; she liked sleeved emotions, open hearts, the idea that someone could still be loved even after they failed. As an adult, failure was failure, but as a child, failure was a part of growing up. And, as her psychology studies had proven to her, it may take a village to raise a child, but it never asked for anything more than love.

Or that was what a childless woman would think. She hadn't wanted life to turn out this way. She'd wanted her experience of pregnancy to be fulfilling, life-altering, a horrible bodily inconvenience that she would nonetheless look back on with warm fondness. She hadn't wanted her only experience of it to be violent in nature.

What had her mother thought? Her mother had never wanted to be pregnant; though she'd never outright said that to Stella or Bedelia, they both knew it from how she carried herself, from how their home was devoid of childish things beyond the girls' bedrooms, from how French lessons started so early that neither could remember learning their first French words. In older ages, their mother never gave them those _talks,_ menstruation a bookish mystery best kept a secret. As a child, Stella had seen her parents' marriage as a political agreement, a stalemate; her mother needed a partner, and her father was happy to oblige, so they were forced together, not quite arranged but certainly not in love either. Stella and her sister existed as set-pieces in their mother's iconically normal life and nothing else.

And now, their mother was going to die. It was supposed to feel like triumph, like grief, like an end, like a beginning, but all it felt like was seasickness and overwhelm, being on a plane making an emergency landing, feeling a sharp pain in the stomach and wondering if that could end it all. It wasn't right. It was supposed to feel right.

Sluggishly, uncomfortably, she forced herself up, needed to see the way her mother had been living. Given the arrangement of the house, she imagined her mother's bedroom to be lined with French art, French chairs, a French bed, French makeup on the French dresser so that her Frenchness could French itself. She stumbled forward, streaking blood across Bedelia's floors, and felt the room spin but pushed on anyway. Would her mother have more gold-plated lipsticks, bags heavily insured, dresses from places Stella could never afford? As she walked past the way to the pool, past the doorway to her bedroom, past the second doorway, she came to the third bedroom on the base floor, where she assumed her mother would have stayed. Pressing the door open, she fell into the room and onto her knees, but to her surprise, the place was anonymous, empty; all that was there were a few pairs of scrubs on the bed, an overnight nurse's change of clothes. Bedelia had put Stella in a bedroom that shared a bathroom with their dying mother's.

 _Fucking cunt,_ she thought as she left that bedroom, littering the immaculate carpet with drops of blood. Stella didn't want to share her mother's bathroom, especially not toward the end of her life. Even so, she hadn't seen anything in the bathroom that would make her think that her mother had ever used it, no crèmes or makeup brushes or even shampoos beyond the sulfite-filled stuff Bedelia must have pawned off on lowly guests. Though she knew she shouldn't be shocked by what dying could render a person to become, she still felt as though there needed to be at least _one_ lipstick or powder-brush, something to prove that she was still the same woman.

Hovering her hand over the handle of her mother's bedroom door, Stella hesitated. Did she want to see where her mother had been set to die? In the original call, Bedelia had mentioned a medical emergency, but her aloofness had made Stella think that Bedelia had shoved their mother into the back of the driver's Mercedes and headed toward the hospital while hoping for the best. When she finally opened the door, she staggered at the sight of bandage-wrappings, abandoned tubes and needles and even two full vials of blood that rested alongside one of those romance-erotica books sold in bulk at every given Walmart, shockingly in English. The bed was torn apart, made up of a cheaper kind of expensive sheets and some scratchy blankets than reminded Stella of when she had the flu as a girl and needed to be uncomfortably wrapped up to sweat out the fever. There were oxygen tanks in the corner, two full ones that glowed in all of their life-giving glory. On top of the ancient-looking dresser, there was no mirror, and the walls were empty. Throughout the room, there was nothing humanizing in sight other than a small television with a D.V.D. player resting on top.

It had grown too challenging to walk, her world swirling around her, so Stella came onto her hands and knees, crawled toward the dresser, concentrated all of her strength so that she could pull open one drawer; inside, there were only pajama sets, fleece on one side and cotton on the other. In the other drawers, she found modest six-pack kinds of underwear, no brassieres whatsoever, adult diapers and spare scrubs for nurses and fresh towels in dark colors. Recalling the days of her mother in Dior made such an array look inhuman in comparison; this was not how her mother would have wished to dress.

As she thrust open the closet, she found no clothes, but a pile of books fell from the top rack to her feet, their balance hingeing on the mutual agreement between inhabitants and doors that no one should open up. Stella pieced through the books, all earth-toned journals banded together in rubber, the pages yellowing with age. As she opened the first, she found her mother's handwriting in half-English, half-French, and she ran a finger over the inked words, over documents of what had been. An account, done by date in the European fashion. One entry that consisted of three words: _il est mort._ Right after Christmas, in the eighties. _Daddy._

As she continued flipping through, she found that phrase again in the same fashion, the dates in later years but the phrase all the same. _Il est mort. Il est mort. Il est mort._ She could remember the uncles who had died in those days, the ones who cast out their fortunes to other relatives, the ones whose money rarely came Stella's way, and she tallied them up as best she could in her head; nonetheless, the statements continued, _il est mort il est mort il est mort._ One followed Bedelia's graduation in quick succession; Stella could only remember the date because of the American plane ticket she had tucked away in her own journal, a ticket that Jo had doodled on aimlessly and thus become valuable as a result. Was that why her mother had remarried so many times, because the husbands would die? Stella could see when each one occurred, and she knew well enough from media and from being an exploitative woman herself - she preferred to call it _leveling_ , or _earning_ , or whatever else that taking money voluntarily offered by idiotic men could be called, but that was beside the point - that it was easiest to go for the older, frailer men who would see value in how a young woman wanted them and, if she was lucky, forego a prenuptial agreement as a result.

But at Bedelia's graduation, the same man from her high school commencement had been there, a nice man, someone brunette and young and muscular but thin. He'd had a soft smile but some secondhand disdain for Stella; he'd been kind to Bedelia, had offered to iron her commencement dress because she didn't know how, had brought Stella a glass of water because the day had been too hot for her British body. He couldn't have been older than forty. Plus, her mother had seemed significantly interested in him; he wasn't logically pursued for cash in a will, but....

_No._

She flipped back through, saw every _il est mort_ again, and each came in an easy succession: after two years of marriage, each man passed without explanation. Though Stella couldn't read the rest of the French, and though her mind was hazy and amiss, she could see the pattern for what it was and knew that it absolutely could not be a coincidence. This house, the richness of it, the drivers available at all hours of the day, none of it had come from money made; it had all come from money stolen. Money, she knew, and lives.

As she found herself staggering against the alcohol, she saw images of Elizabeth Báthory bathing, body by crimson. The last thing she could remember before losing consciousness was that, in her stumbles, she'd accidentally broken one of the vials of blood open.

* * *

 

The platter sat on top of a plastic hospital chair, looking as peculiar and out-of-place as the man and woman in the room did, both dressed too well for past midnight in the intensive care unit, both full on escargot and liver and some snuck-in wine. On either side of the bed's footboard, they sat, a colleague's distance between them. Before he'd come to her home, she'd put on a new lipstick and lace panties that, though she knew he would never see, she'd felt drawn to wear anyway. It was odd but somehow expectable, she found, to eat an indulgent meal with this man while her nearby mother lived through her final moments.

"Your sister is an interesting character," Hannibal said.

Bedelia took a deep, calculated breath, looked at him with intensity.

"We have very little in common," Bedelia gave. "We were never close as girls."

"You bear a striking resemblance," he said. "I didn't realize that you have English heritage."

"I've been an American citizen for decades," she said, brushing the topic off.

"And what kind of pride is there in being American?"

She smirked, then looked to her mother. Maman was still on the ventilator, had been given a sedative to help her sleep through the night. They'd given her only a week to live, the horrors of end-of-life becoming a comfortable reality for Bedelia; yes, she knew of all of her mother's blood cultures, of every medication the woman took, of the last seven hospital visits, of how to reach any in-home nurses. Long ago, doctors had recommended in-hospital hospice care, but Bedelia found something inhuman in that, in forcing her mother into a place where all went to die. Human beings were so out of touch with their natural instincts, the ways that their bodies were built up but destined to fall apart, and she refused to cast her mother out. Ideally, her mother would have passed at home, somewhere comfortable even if Maman continuously complained about the sheets, the bed, the decor, everything, and Bedelia would have been able to watch, to hold her mother's hand, to be present. She'd read years ago that Buddhist monks would sit alongside the bodies of their deceased loved ones for days after their deaths, thinking about life and its natural end and the horrible, beautiful things in between; she'd imagined sitting alongside her mother, thinking about her own death, thinking about those who had gone before her, and she'd imagined not reporting the death until a few days later, once she could feel that her mother wasn't in the house anymore. In the imaginings, she would take clients at their scheduled times, and in between taking notes, she would think of her mother downstairs, let death bleed into her sessions. Though she knew the validity of mental illness, the complexity of the brain and body, she still wondered just how many of her patients would suddenly find themselves cured if they sat alongside a deceased loved one for a day. Many, she figured, would grow worse, but some would book a ticket to a far-away place and never come back, living in a way that made their brains forget which parts of the world were and weren't a part of them.

But she wasn't a Buddhist, and neither was Maman, so they were in a hospital, her mother was intubated because Bedelia had insisted being in control of fate, and her colleague and patient was alongside her, offering what she knew he could supply. First, they'd eaten, and now, she needed his other offerings. He could see the conviction in her face, in the way she stared him down, and though this was her decision, not her mother's, she knew that, from the coughing fits and the blood and the endless and stalling process that dying could be, this was the proper thing to do.

Reaching into his coat, Hannibal pulled out a worn leather pouch, stood so that he could hand the pouch to her.

Meeting his gaze, she took the pouch, gave a genuine, "Thank you."

He nodded in acceptance to her, then removed himself from the room, closing its door as he went. Of course, he hadn't needed to ask her if she knew how to administer such a thing.

First, there was the matter of the alarms, of the machines, and from the youngest days of her residency, she could remember working in intensive care, could remember Martin Harrington and how he asked her specifically for help in this regard: he had fucked up, and he knew that she was the only other resident who would understand. During those days, many pegged her in such a way, not for her faults but because she'd been manipulated into a public scenario used as a _teaching mechanism;_ the chief resident had made an example of her. After twenty-four hours of being on-call for the first time, she was administering a basic injection, the chief resident hovering all the while, when the patient began to convulse, seize, choke, and she'd found herself in fight-flight-freeze while those around her shouted, screamed directions, told her what to do in ways that made her feel smaller and more alone. In the end, the convulsing patient was a roommate of the chief resident's and had been paid a hundred dollars to freak Bedelia out, and ever since then, one thing was made clear to the residents: always know who your patient is, what you're administering, and that you can't trust anyone else in the hospital.

So, Martin knew that Bedelia was the one to speak to when something went horrendously wrong, for Bedelia didn't trust anyone, not the other residents, not the chief resident, not the higher-ups. In the past, Bedelia, with the skills Margaret had taught her in high school, was the one to forge documents, to write that a nurse had committed malpractice, not someone who was up to their ears in student debt and would never find a job again if their mistake were found out. Bedelia would cover shifts at any given time. Bedelia would do anything to avoid embarrassment, hurt, blame; Bedelia, who couldn't trust anyone, was, in some ways, the only resident whom the other residents would trust.

Martin had improperly set up the alarms on a trauma patient, and on that particular day, two car accidents and a drive-by shooting littering their beds, all of the on-call staff had been particularly frazzled, jobs being pawned off on the inexperienced while others called as many staff members as they could, desperately seeking help. As a result, Martin's patient had had breathing problems that went unnoticed, and now, the patient was circling the drain, unable to be resuscitated without having Martin fired in the process. All in all, Martin wasn't a bad doctor; he had had the same situation thrust upon him that had left Bedelia shaking and sobbing in bed after her first twenty-four, and it wasn't his fault that western medicine didn't give a shit about living or dying. However, he had worked throughout college just to pay for medical school, his single mother tirelessly putting away money in hope that he would someday accomplish his dream; that dream could be torn apart if this patient died. Or, rather, if anyone knew _how_ this patient died.

If she couldn't trust anyone, then she couldn't trust any machine either, so she knew how these alarms worked, how each room was set up, how to remove any trace of a human life. The patient - a man, mid-sixties - was not relevant enough to be missed and just old enough to ignore, so Bedelia scrubbed Martin's name from the chart, figured that Marcia Lewis - a big-chested bitch who had stuffed menstrual pads into every crevasse of Bedelia's locker after an unfortunate night with a hemophiliac left Bedelia with an even more unfortunate stain, and a woman who just happened to have been brought in to assist with one of the gunshot patients - could use some discipline and was thus added in replacement. She silenced each alarm in a way that made it seem that they had never been on in the first place, connected the saline improperly so that all of the residents could watch Marcia be retaught. In the end, Martin's dream was safe, and though Marcia glared especially hard at all of them that week, Bedelia never found pads stuffed into her locker again.

She knew how to lock and unlock hospital doors, how to avoid security, how to silence alarms and cover things up and leave no trace behind. She'd disconnected life support before. Weeks ago, she'd even imagined this night, but at the time, she'd lacked the means to carry it out, so all she could do was insist that her mother be put on a ventilator and hope that maybe, through mechanical breathing and manipulated social work, Bedelia could remain in control.

From the pouch, she took a syringe and bottle, and as she filled the syringe, she watched the shaky and effort-filled way that Maman's chest rose and fell. Humans were so strange, made to last but meant to die, a means to an end that held no meaning. Of course, it was only human to apply meaning to life, but what was life without meaning? She flicked the syringe a few times, let out any lingering bubbles of air. As she took Maman's hand in her open one, she held the syringe at the ready, wondering what such a simple act could mean. What was there within life exactly, other than some culmination of hedonism and masochism? She wasn't sure she could find pessimism in cynicism when the biological imperative of all was to survive; the revelation that all worked with their own wellbeing in mind was rational, and if anything, kindness was anomalous, not self-interest. In a certain sense, love was a survival threat, yet everyone and everything obsessed over love, making it the cornerstone of life.

Was that the point of living, to love even though such a thing was largely useless to human life? She pulled Maman's fingers apart, pinky and ring, took to the syringe again. To a degree, she didn't understand why she hadn't done the same to herself yet; she wasn't sure that there was much more that she wanted, and places like Sweden, maybe Switzerland, she couldn't remember, would do such a thing for something as minor as _personal suffering,_ bullying with an adult name. That was the hard part in mental healthcare, determining whether something was a disorder or a human condition, and she was sick of seeing depressed patients brought down by their jobs, by God, by circumstances that seemed largely irrelevant to the happenings of the world. Though she knew their pain was real, acute, worthy of treatment, she doubted she could help them, for their human flaw was in their minds, in their situations, not in their biochemistry. She brought the needle to Maman's skin in between the digits, a small and unnoticeable place, and broke the skin.

The Death with Dignity Act had been passed in multiple states, the more liberal ones but states nonetheless. Her mother would have _hypoxia_ listed as her cause of death anyway. Bedelia didn't believe in God. As she emptied the syringe, she wondered if she should've asked Stella to join, then smirked uncomfortably as she pictured the evening, Stella standing outside of the hospital room because she claimed she couldn't watch. Strange, it was, how Stella had likely seen more death than Bedelia had yet still lived in fear of it while Bedelia was more scared of her detachment from death rather than of death itself.

She pulled the syringe away, left it on the bed, took Maman's hand in both of hers. In a matter of minutes, her mother would be dead, her heart stopping, her failing lungs stilling. Stroking Maman's hand, Bedelia stared down at the woman's bluish lips, her closed eyes, her tired lashes and brow that used to be painted on. _French lips,_ her mother used to describe them as, but then again, she said everything about her was French even though she hadn't lived in France since she was a teenager. Last week, she had asked for red wine, so Bedelia dismissed the nurse and drank a glass with her, then carried her to the bathroom when the interactions with her medications made her sick. She always complained about Bedelia's home, particularly the echoes of her therapy sessions. She was allergic to bees, but nonetheless, she sat out in the yard while Bedelia gardened through spring. At one point, she even trimmed a few hedges.

With ease, she could silence the ventilator, keep her mother's failing lungs from inflating once more. It was simple, really, but somehow, she felt that she needed to give her actions meaning, a poetic line, the kind of grace said before a holiday meal.

 _No, you don't need to do that,_ she forced upon herself, then began to disconnect life support.

* * *

In an instant, Stella was back in the hospital, her mother on the bed in front of her, but Mum wasn't on the ventilator anymore; she was still, a cadaver of sorts, clearly gone in a way that left Stella unfazed at crime scenes but should have overwhelmed her in such a personal setting. _My mother is dead,_ she thought, the musing going through her mind and then leaving with dull, meditative ease; as she looked around, she didn't see Bedelia or any nurses, just a dead woman in a bed, her less-loved daughter seated facing her.

 _Will this be how I die?_ Stella asked herself. _Alone, in a white room, with no one left to care about whether or not I'm breathing?_ Though logically she couldn't be sure, she felt deeply the answer to be yes, and she stared on at the scene before her as though she could will her future to change.

"Stella?"

Quickly, she twisted around, faced a glaring door to the hospital's hallway, and as she knew from the voice, Jo stood there, leaned into the jamb of the door while her scuffed-up suede pumps crossed at the ankles, her blouse falling open to reveal just enough of the tattoo Stella had only partially seen on the night they met. The blonde bob, the soft eyes, the unrelenting half-scowl on her lips that Stella knew was just for show, it was all there, alarmingly human before her. For the first time in years, Stella could truly speak to her.

"Jo," she managed, the woman's name a breathless word on her lips, an ache forming in her jaw. _Jo_. She felt the syllable within her haze, a sobering yet sinful utterance; so many years later, she wasn't sure if seeing this woman again was a form of salvation or just another scratch on her thigh.

"Your mother is dead," Jo gave in her honest tone, just soft enough to be kind, just blunt enough to be real.

Halfheartedly, Stella laughed, for there was no other response she found worthy.

"Would you like her back?" Jo asked, so Stella furrowed her brow; it was unlike Jo to ask such things, the impossible things, the hypotheticals that only led to emotional pain. A Jo question would've been about how Stella wanted to move forward, not about how she wished to regain what once was real.

"No," Stella managed, for it was the truth, but as she stared back at her dead mother, she wished she could have a different answer.

"You can have one back," Jo said, leaning into her tired gait and finding her way to Mum's bedside.

As Jo sat alongside Mum's body, she looked toward the dead woman with soft, never-pitying eyes. It was odd how Jo expressed empathy, in little ways that made all of the difference but were outwardly confusing, and Stella wanted to stay here, to watch Jo, to see her interact with the world. Could she see Jo outside of this hospital, out in America with its loud people and louder disdain? Could she have watched Jo open her eyes on that slab, hear her say that this was all just a fluke, a mistake? Could she have Jo hold her again like she did on the night that-

"Stella?"

His warm, familiar hand fell to her shoulder, and as she looked up, she saw her father, his beautiful face from his younger years smiling down at her, his height seeming the same as it had when she was a girl. However, he had the cane he'd used in his final years clutched to him, and she could tell from the roughness of his voice that he was close to passing, tobacco taking his life in ways that made her comfortable with all methods of self-harm except cigarettes. If there was something her father had taught her, it was that humans felt no fear until a loved one succumbed.

"My star," he gave softly, her hand coming softly to caress her neck, and Stella tore her gaze away from him, stared at Jo while Jo studied the dead woman, lifted Mum's hand, stroked it softly, comfortingly, as though even in death she could still be of aid.

"One," Jo repeated.

As Stella reached for her choice, she found herself shaken from the dream, her heart pounding, her sheets in Bedelia's guest room drenched in sweat, and suddenly, she felt nauseous, the room spinning, a headache keeping her from moving. She forced herself to breathe, but between the alcohol and the dream, she couldn't calm herself, felt overwhelm shuddering throughout her body. If she managed to find her cell phone, she could call her therapist, say it was an emergency, or she could go into her medicine cabinet and take out the expired bottle of pills that she kept for times like this - or other times that she didn't want to admit to - and take one, maybe two, until the biological effects wore off. But she wasn't home; she was in Delia's - _Be_ delia's - guest bedroom, and she was going to vomit, but she couldn't move, and she could feel hot tears falling from her eyes, uncomfortable drool seeping from her mouth, and-

Tensing, she noticed a movement at the foot of the bed, then focused her hazy eyes on her sister, who sat there with her legs together, her hands folded on her lap, her gaze facing toward the door. Though Bedelia was still dressed, she looked different, more childlike, more raw. Her hair had begun to frizz.

Softly, Stella leaned forward, stared at her sister, felt her pounding heart punctuate the silence between them.

"She's gone," Bedelia gave with indifferent gravity; though she wanted to seem unaffected, she nonetheless wanted her words to have the meaning of a lengthy poem, of a gutting story. She wanted to defy her own statement, as though death, like all other biological matters, could be something over which to triumph.

But, for Stella, it wasn't, so she pulled herself to the side of the bed, the farthest she could manage from the more expensive sheets and carpets, and let herself be sick.


	5. Interlude: The Man

Stella wouldn't remember his name afterward, but sometimes, after meeting a man and hearing him speak his own name, she would feel the burn of acid at the back of her throat, an involuntary act of fear and repulsion, and she would rally that name up for evidence.  _ Edmund. Richard. Peter. _ Whatever his name was, he was older, graying and executive and high-up wherever he worked. In London, he had a brilliant flat, two floors of robust indulgence, a grand piano and a personal chef and a collection of records that she used to run her fingers over, the sleeves comforting to the touch. He was tall, muscular, agile, and he liked to prove those things to her.

"See?" he would say, and in a moment, she would be flat on her stomach, her breasts colliding with his granite countertops, her feet desperately reaching for a floor they could never reach. Then, he would press his whole arm against her back, a way to subdue her, to prove that she couldn't possibly fight back, and as he hiked up her skirt, he would say, "I'll always be strong. You're nothing but skin and bones."

She found that he would be gentler if she said  _ yes, _ so most times, she did. Other times, she would try to kick her way out of his grasp while he snaked his fingers between her legs, inside her, but those times, she felt his disdain through his nails ripping at her flesh, leaving her bleeding and aching for days on end, so most of the time, she would simply lie still, and when he pushed her legs open, she would oblige.  _ It could be worse,  _ she told herself, and unfortunately, she knew she was right.

But there was a good side, too, in how he payed for her wherever they went and how he gave her a hundred quid when she so much as insinuated the possibility of needing money. With her mother overseas and unwilling to take her calls, Stella needed money to get by, and though her education was payed through wire transfers whenever a tuition bill came in, she lacked income or any kind of allowance, and this man supplied money in large, steady increments. With money from a small job, she could make her rent - she'd always told him that she lived in a secure dormitory, not in a tiny flat above a Greek cafe - but she couldn't find money for food, for clothing, for textbooks or weekend trips or even a train ticket simply to go to class. However, this man had money, and he wanted her to have that money, would take her out to balls and dress her well and keep his hand on her waist all evening while other adults fawned over her, his little sweetness, a woman of education and class, young and blonde and with blue eyes that just told a  _ story _ . Sometimes, she would go to high-end restaurants alone wearing the dresses he bought her and pretend that she was among her people, that high society life was something she'd been born into, that education was beneath her and ultimately unnecessary for her lifestyle. The feelings she had on those nights almost made his actions seem worth the pain.

And of course they had sex, real sex, the kind of sex that didn't scare her. In some ways, that sex felt like worship in how he would kneel before her like she was a goddess to him, an immaculate figure, the virgin she knew she wasn't; he would lotion her skin and massage her, pleasure her until her whole body felt loose and languid, tell her that she was beautiful and ethereal and pure until she believed those things to be true. By the time he was finished, she would be curled in his big bed with its luxuriously soft sheets, her young body fully naked, and as she shut her eyes, he would ask, "Why would I have done that if I knew you wouldn't suck my cock afterward?"

Once, she denied him that askance, and the next morning, she skipped class for the first time while she spent her morning in the emergency room, praying that her swollen-shut eye hadn't been permanently damaged. To the nurse, she'd claimed it was an accident, that she'd run into a lamppost while riding a bicycle; it only took one look at the nurse, desperation clear in Stella's eyes, to prove that the lie, though it put Stella in danger, was a lie she needed to tell.

_ Of course it's like this, _ she would tell herself when she bled.  _ You're practically stealing from him. It's a business transaction. You're no better than a prostitute, and prostitutes end up killed. But he'll never kill you. You're lucky to have someone like him. _ He would slam her onto the kitchen counter, and even as the persistent bruises on her ribs ached, as he pushed inside her despite her involuntary muscular resistance, she would insist that, if she didn't have him, she would likely be dead somewhere, starved and evicted, no money to her name. Nowhere wanted to hire a twenty-year-old for a real job, but this man indulged in her age. She was glad to see that at least one person seemed to care about whether she lived or died.

And he never interfered with her education even though he was verbally against it; on her examination days, he kept quiet and waited for the ends of semesters in order to take her out to a place in the country, where he'd fuck her against a pasture fence even though - or, to her discomfort, because - the neighbors could clearly see them. He would bring her back to campus at every scheduled time, playing the obliging parent. Sometimes, he even asked about her grades, but mostly, he remained uninterested in her studies or her university life beyond her schedule. What he couldn't control, however, was that there was more to disrupting her education than simply avoiding her on examination days and prioritizing her on the weekends.

"I'm pregnant," she told him on a cool January evening while he drank a rum-and-coke. He'd put on a Chopin nocturne to ease the mood after dinner. In the kitchen beyond their living room, the cook froze while washing dishes, then, after a breath, returned to scrubbing, the concept a shock at first but so highly, easily expected after that.

Collectedly, he asked the cook to leave early, which she hesitantly obliged, her eyes on Stella as she slowly left.

"We'll marry, then," he decided. "You'll live here. No need for school."

Her brow furrowing in disdain, she gave, practically spat, "I won't marry you."

"I don't believe that's your decision to make."

"Of course it is," she said.

_ Stop, _ she told herself.  _ If you say things like that, he'll hurt you. Just agree with him. Say whatever you need to say. Tomorrow, get on a train to whatever country will have you, and if you can't get rid of this yourself, find someone who will. Or eradicate the whole problem. You know he'll be the only one who'll miss you. _

"We'll marry," he gave finitely, his fading face full of silent contempt, "and that is final."

Taking a deep breath, she thought of it, of the coupled gametic product they'd created, of the times since he'd stopped wearing a condom and would hit her if she asked why. Right now, their child was the size of an apple seed. She could stomp those beneath the heel of her shoe.

"I don't want to be pregnant," she spoke up.

In her next memory, there were muffled sirens and police lights in the night. She felt cold, but there was a blanket around her. Her vision was blurry.

"Honey, what's your name?" a woman asked.

She was in the back of a police car, the doors open. In the distance, an ambulance sat silently, lights on but in no rush. His house seemed so much smaller from that angle, so much less ravish. One of the front windows was broken, something dark smeared around it.

"Honey, I need to know who you are," the woman insisted softly, warmly, her voice practically a coo.

The woman was pressed against her in the backseat, her body obscuring most of Stella's view in the dark. Wearing a smart blazer and skirt, she looked too well-dressed for the evening. Stella's clothes felt wet.

"Was that your father?" the woman asked softly. "Could you tell me his name?"

"Stella," she managed, her throat feeling scratchy and unmovable.

Perking up, the woman asked, "Is that your name?"

Though Stella tried to nod, she couldn't manage the movement, not with the way her whole neck felt. Her head throbbed as she tried to look at the woman's face in the flashing light. Wide eyes, hair cut in a bob, high cheekbones, lipstick so thick that Stella could even see it in the dark.

"My name's Jo," she said with a small smile. "I'm with the police. I'm here to make sure you stay safe."

Forcefully, Stella tried to form words, but each one caught in her aching throat, so Jo moved closer, Stella's limp side flush with Jo's warm one, Jo letting Stella's bloodied head rest on her collarbone.

"You don't have to say anything," Jo gave. "But I do need you to let the paramedics see you this time. They'll help with your neck."

What did she know? How could she tell Stella was hurt? Why did she know about how Stella's neck felt? As Stella's head spun, she tried to focus on what she needed to say, to manage just a few words.

"Pregnant," Stella forced, then fully collapsed against Jo, weightless and exhausted, unable to utter another word.


	6. Interlude: The Woman

Though Bedelia knew of America as the _land of possibility_ and _the place of all cultures,_ she found that the one exception to those labels must be all-girls boarding schools.

At the one rotary phone in her dorm building - a converted house with small bedrooms whose windows pooled anciently at their bases, a place with chipping paint and creaking floorboards and iron furniture with scuff-marks of past lives - she would call her mother as snickers in the phone line made her mother's voice hard to hear. While many girls at the school prided themselves in their mock-Europeanness, their _héritage,_ it was only posh if they spoke French in their American-but-vacations-in-Belgium accents; when Bedelia spoke it on the phone to her mother, she was a classless dimwit, a freak whose words made her sound infinitely phlegmy. Of course, one accent wasn't enough, so she had the English influence as well, something mirrored in the most commonplace and obnoxious of ways.

"Delia, how are you?" a girl would ask her in passing, the two of them on the same brick walkway through the autumn-cast campus; leaves fell in peak colors, littering the New England buildings in a warm glow.

"Great, thank you," Bedelia would say, but as soon as she passed the girl, she would hear that girl mimic _great, thehnk yew_ with disgust or laughter. What was worse was that not responding at all, keeping quiet, led to something worse, a pestering and poking that made her sister's annoyances seem shockingly mild; the best thing to do was keep her head down but respond when prompted in short, controlled sentences. Then, at least, she could get through a day without feeling on the verge of tears.

It was in French class that she first gained a voice, with Madame Beaumont asking her to share with the class her _héritage_ and experiences with the class: summering in Strasbourg, picking up German from cute boys, drinking wine because that's normal within the culture, giggling in a French girl kind of way that those in _les États-Unis_ would never understand. Of course, it was all inflated - she'd never been to Strasbourg, she rarely wanted to speak to boys in any language, and the one time she'd ever had wine had been at her first communion - but nonetheless, these girls could see that she had an edge, an advantage; they could mock her accent as much as they liked, but during Bedelia's college interviews, she would be able to speak two languages with ease while these girls who had never left their home state stumbled through only one. While these girls learned French, Bedelia _was_ French, so these girls would always be outsiders in comparison. The best part, however, was that Madame Beaumont rarely had Bedelia read aloud because her spoken French was clearly the best in the class, and therefore, she didn't need as much practice as the Americans did. By only speaking and never reading, she was the perfect French student, the one who had learned vocabulary before it was included in a lesson, the one who always knew the correct answers. She'd never been like that in school before.

But the French of her first year turned into an independent study in her second year, her speaking skills too advanced for any of the offered classes and her lessons continuing in one-on-one sessions with Madame Beaumont, sessions she enjoyed but sessions that took away her recognition. By the end of her first trimester of her sophomore year - right before Thanksgiving, the stupidest of American holidays - the girls were making fun of her again, and now, they didn't care how well she spoke French because she was no longer a threat to them. Once again, she was just the girl who struggled with reading _Hamlet_ aloud and not because of the Shakespearian tone; she was just the one who spoke something else into the one phone in her dorm building, just the one whose roommate would complain about Bedelia's jetlagged sleeping habits that eventually turned to true insomnia. In a world of competitive women, no one wanted to be the losing girl, and Bedelia, without her French classes, was exactly that.

For most girls, transportation away from school around holidays or vacations was arranged among friends - those going to similar areas would force their parents into a loud teenage carpool that Bedelia would never understand the enjoyment of - but Bedelia was forced into a school van headed to the nearest airport each time, her suitcase thrown haphazardly into the back and a few girls speaking Chinese or Spanish sitting in the van and talking to friends whose flights they would share, discussing meetups back in their home countries, complaining about the time difference. Usually, Bedelia took a lone window seat and stared at the passing Connecticut countryside - or, rather, what she pretended was countryside - until they eventually arrived at the airport, but this time, a woman - a teacher in the language department, not in French or Spanish but something else - climbed in at the very last minute, her bag thrown in on top of Bedelia's, and sat right alongside her.

"Hey," the woman said. She was brunette, held the kind of excited smile that bubbled over into a laugh sometimes. Her hair was pulled into a lazy bun, and she wore jeans with a big fisherman's sweater, the grey wool looking worn, her thumb sticking through a hole in the sleeve. Though the sweater was baggy around the rest of her body, it was tight at her shoulders, bulky with muscle, a recognizable thickness that reminded Bedelia of being in locker rooms with her sister and seeing other women walk by on their way to the pool. "Spain, right?"

Bedelia tried to find words but couldn't, her mind stuck on how she'd never seen a teacher look this casual, this normal.

"England," Bedelia managed to clarify, then swallowed down the word. She hated going home for breaks.

But the woman perked up at the word, said, "Great, so you're the one I'm flying with."

Bedelia furrowed her brow.

"Impulsive trip." The woman shrugged. "I'm sick of being stuck here. It's all those walls, right? They're all so...."

The school's buildings were painted a solid, ugly color, so bright and abrasive. Bedelia scrunched up her face in disgust; the woman laughed.

"Yeah, it's like that," the woman said, then held out a hand. "I'm Margaret. Carroll, that is. Last name. Or, rather, _surname,_ where you're from."

Bedelia took Margaret's hand cautiously and shook.

"And you?" Margaret asked, taking back her hand.

Bedelia took a deep breath. The girls here had never liked her name.

"Bedelia," she gave in resignation, then added even though it wasn't the truth, "du Maurier."

"Oh, yeah, Brigitte's been telling me about you," Margaret said. "You speak French, right? Really fluently, I hear."

"Yeah," Bedelia said, then felt heat rise in her neck, an oncoming blush. She hated blushing.

"Beaumont, I mean. Sorry, I'm off-duty, so I can't be professional anymore. I'm going on _vacation._ I meant Beaumont," she added a dramatic French accent but not a mocking one, " _Madam Beaumont._ She wants you to enter an essay contest, right? Something about French heritage."

Bedelia nodded. She didn't want to enter the essay contest.

Now, the driver had shut the doors and was starting to pull away from the school.

"I assume you grew up in England," Margaret gave, relaxing. She wasn't wearing a seatbelt.

"Yes," Bedelia said.

"Did you learn French growing up?"

Bedelia nodded. "From my mother."

"Did you know that learning a language - or even just hearing one - before you turn two can make learning languages later in life much easier?" Margaret asked, that little bit of excitement bubbling over her chapped lips. "You've set yourself up well. Have you tried learning others?"

"No, never," Bedelia said sheepishly. "It was always French lessons and just French lessons."

 _Because I can't write it or read it,_ she left out.

"Well," Margaret gave, "if you want to start learning another one, there's plenty to choose from. What would be your second choice?"

"Second choice?"

Margaret conceded, "A _third_ choice. Some of us aren't polyglots, you know."

"Polyglots?"

"Speaking multiple languages." Though Bedelia knew that all Americans talked too fast, this woman happened to be exceptionally good at talking too fast. "So. What would you choose?"

Bedelia was ignoring the Connecticut countryside.

"I don't know," she gave, comfortably flustered. "Spanish, I suppose. It's practical."

"Your first language is the practical one," Margaret said. "Your second is the useful one, the one that means you can do more than you could with just plain old practicality. After those two, you don't have to mean anything by your language. It's just yours."

Softly, Bedelia smiled, asked, "Is that scientific fact?"

"Purely personal opinion," Margaret said. Then, she insisted, "Come on. There has to be _something_ that you want to learn."

"Italian," Bedelia gave, shrugging. "Russian, perhaps."

" _That's_ an English thing to say," Margaret gave with a laugh that Bedelia didn't understand. "Russian. An artel's pot boils denser."

Bedelia smiled awkwardly, didn't know what that meant.

"Which class are you in?"

Bedelia furrowed her brow. _Do they ask things like that here?_

"I'm in economy because I teach Latin," Margaret said. "You?"

_Oh. For the flight._

"The same," she gave. "Maman thinks it builds character."

Margaret laughed lightly. "I think I'd like your mother."

Bedelia tried not to grimace.

At the airport, it was a treat to have someone nearby, to have Margaret guide her to the proper gate and sit with her while they waited to board. Margaret taught Latin at all levels, had an office in the library, spoke English and shockingly nothing else. However, she'd been trying - and mostly failing - to learn German because her boyfriend's family was German; she was always looking for a way to impress them even though she didn't like admitting that. For college, she'd gone to an all-women's school, and she believed she'd only been offered her current job as a result of that. Her favorite book was _The Stranger,_ which she had a copy of in her handbag.

"Actually, I'd like you to take this," she said, passing the copy - torn at the edges, with _Margaret Carroll_ written on the inside of the paperback cover - to Bedelia while they sat at the gate. "Read it, and tell me what you think. You read, right? So many girls here don't read."

"I read," Bedelia said even though she'd barely managed a C on her final English paper.

"Great! It's short, and it's a favorite," Margaret said, "and it's French! I forgot about that, totally forgot. But that copy's in English. Bring it back after the break, okay? And tell me what you think."

By the time Bedelia found herself in her bedroom at home, her little sister waltzing through the halls with Daddy while her mother largely ignored them all, she sat down at her desk, pulled out Margaret's book, ran her fingers over the worn pages and wondered what it was like for Margaret herself to hold this book, how it felt for her to flip through its pages. Though Bedelia knew better than to think she could read a book on her first - or second, or third - try, she opened the book anyway, pieced through to the first page with text, and surprisingly, she found an odd color gradient across the words, a suspicious highlight on thick pages that had been colored - voluntarily, it appeared - a darker shade so that the black text was more visible. Staring down at the words on the page, Bedelia furrowed her brow, found that the letters stayed still, didn't blend together, and though she still took a moment to understand what was on the page, the words were remarkably clearer than they had been in her copy of _Hamlet._ At first, she read what she could silently, but then, she found herself whispering the words, laughing just a little at how much easier this felt, shocked by the way that such simple additions meant that she could make it through a page - a whole page! - without stopping.

She wasn't the only one like this. Whatever it was that made reading so much harder for her, Margaret had it too.

She managed to read the whole book twice before she had to return to school.


	7. Interlude: Wet

The scene: a rich enough house in the English countryside, neighbors close by enough to understand the happenings but far enough away to decide to ignore them. Out front, two cars are parked, one expensive but a few years older than most rich men let expensive cars get and the other a modest sedan. There is landscaping that was never done by the owner of the house. The windows, for the moment, are intact.

Inside the house, there is a girl, about twenty, and she is eating her baked ziti sparsely. Since she started seeing the man across from her - brunette, a bit chubby around the waist, his hairline not receding but his brows going grey - she has lost a stone and a half. The last time she tried to swim, she managed two laps before pulling herself up onto the banks of the pool and gasping for breath, arms shaking with fatigue, heart beating too quickly. When she chews, she forces herself to think of something nice, something benign, something like the flowers he bought her this afternoon, cut roses in an off-white shade, a dozen that sit at the center of his dining room table as if it were an altar to her. However, her thoughts tend to drift to two things - where she'll sleep tonight, what she has to tell him - so she stops eating altogether. The man's hired cook at first thought the rejected full plate to be an insult but has since come to understand.

There are paintings on the walls. The girl has always liked the paintings. When she was first taken here, she remarked about the paintings to the man, then woke at four-thirty in the morning so that she could be alone with each painting, biding her silent time between his snores. Though some look like attempts to replicate Rembrandt, others have a raw, earthy quality to them, the soil tones of red and brown and the textures along the canvas drawing her eye in. Sometimes, she thinks that's what her insides look like, a little torn apart but beautiful in their destruction. She has recently come to the revelation that she would be lucky to live to be twenty-five years old.

The cook is dismissed. Though the cook knows what it about to happen, she also knows that she cannot prevent it from happening, so she leaves. She doesn't expect the girl to understand.

Normally, his first move would be one the girl was familiar with: her hands bound behind her back, her chest shoved down onto the table, his mouth angry, wet, and hot against her ear. He goes for her neck instead, lunges at her and wraps his thick fingers around her pale skin, digs each knuckle in, pushes her against the wall. Though he has no intention of killing her, he wants her to know that he can. As always, she struggles against him, and it makes him laugh, then tighten his grip. She kicks where she knows it'll hurt; he knows her too well to have left such spots vulnerable; she wheezes and chokes in a pitiful way, trying to make absolutely any sound she can, trying just to breathe. She's wrong to protest. Either she breathes on his terms, or she doesn't breathe at all.

But he had never choked her before, not even in bed, and it's amazing how quickly your hand tires.

* * *

 

The sedatives made her vomit upon waking, and the neck brace forced her to choke on it. A woman's hand was on her cheek.

"Step away," a nurse urged, and the woman, the same from the car, stepped back, her top askew and revealing the slightest bit of a black-ink tattoo. In the brash light of the hospital, the woman looked older, more haggard, just as exhausted as Stella felt. The woman - Jo, she'd said her name was, and surprisingly, Stella could remember that even if being put in an ambulance was now a blur - crossed her arms uncomfortably, as though she felt a chill, while the nurse forced Stella to look to the ceiling in an attempt to clear her airway.

She would never actually regain a memory of the events, and because the man would never end up giving a true statement to the police, Stella could only piece together what little evidence was offered from the house. In the end, the running theory was that after she tried to escape from his choke-hold, she went for the door but, as usual, it was shut with multiple bolts that she couldn't undo quickly enough. Had the man not been so greatly injured, the police would have assumed she then fought him off and opted for one of the front windows of the house instead, breaking the glass and crawling through, but the man - concussed to the point of being in a fully-darkened hospital room with no sound, checked for internal bleeding, losing vision in both eyes from what was assumed to be drastic and deep fingernail scratches - had clearly been met with a fight back. The theory continued to say that after he tried to choke her again, this time with greater pressure, he managed to bring her to the floor, and she, in turn, managed to take a series of nearby heavy objects in a succession that rendered him unconscious and broke a window. On the landscaped lawn outside, an ornately-carved metal cigar box, about a stone in weight, was found cracked and undone with glass surrounding it, patches of snow and grass showing flecks of blood in the direction of the nearest neighboring house. She hadn't worn shoes.

It hurt to breathe. All along her arms, she had thick gauze taped on. At some point, they must have taken her clothes, but they'd given her extra blankets and a pair of thick socks as if they already knew how she would spend her night: feeling cold, feeling exposed, feeling as though she had been paralyzed during his attacks. As the nurse left, Jo slowly, timidly returned to her spot alongside Stella's bed; she sat on a chair close to Stella's right shoulder, intravenous bags right above her head. Among the drugged pains Stella felt, there was one that was most conspicuous, one she knew the meaning behind.

As Stella opened her mouth to speak, Jo quickly shook her head, said, "No, you can't talk. Or, rather, it's best if you don't."

The neck brace made her skin crawl, and even though she wasn't cuffed to the bed, she nonetheless felt stuck, completely reliant, unmoving. Were her legs alright? So far, she figured she had only a few broken ribs, some cuts on her arms, a sore neck from a predictable source. She wasn't badly hurt, all things considered. She should at least be able to sit up.

Though she tried once to straighten her back, she couldn't raise her body at all, not with the sedatives, not with the exhaustion, not with the pain. Seeing Stella's frustration, her anxiety, Jo took Stella's right hand into her own, looked down at Stella.

"Tap my hand once for yes and twice for no, alright?" Jo asked, a little comforting smile on her lips.

Though it took an inordinate amount of energy, Stella managed to tap once. Jo's face lit up, her failing face makeup unable to hide the flush in her cheeks; Stella wasn't the only one in this room who felt afraid.

"Do you know where you are?" Jo asked, so Stella tapped twice.

"It's a hospital, but I assume you know that."

Stella tapped once.

"We found your identification," Jo gave, "and it lists an address in London. We're a bit far from there, I'm afraid."

Softly, Stella tugged her hand away, so Jo furrowed her brow in concern. As Stella looked down at her hands, she saw bruising on her knuckles, an ugly swell within each joint, and it took an uncomfortably long time for her to form three sign language letters, the finger-spelling poorly done but present nonetheless.

"I'm sorry," Jo said, shaking her head and meeting Stella's gaze. "I don't understand."

Forcibly, Stella mouthed the word, spelled it again, felt her wrist ache with the effort of it. Her mouth went round, lips out, and Jo tried replicating the motion, putting a sound to it.  _ Ooh. Oh? Uh. Oh! _

" _ Who, _ " Jo managed. Looking down at Stella's hand, she matched the motions, her  _ h _ poorly executed but at least understandable. "Who. Who am I?"

She took Stella's hand back; Stella tapped once.

"I'm with the police," Jo gave. "Chief Inspector."

Why was a Chief Inspector at her bedside? It had to be well into the night hours, and Stella doubted that this woman - well-dressed, wearing scuffed heels, coated in lipstick - had any reason to deal with cases below her pay-grade. With her hand, Stella tried to spell three more letters, and luckily, Jo seemed to catch on, the words following in a sensical order.

"Why?" Jo asked, and Stella confirmed the question with a tap. "Why am I here, you mean?" Stella tapped again. "Well, I wasn't the first choice. They couldn't get a hold of a proper psychologist at this late of an hour, and I guess I'm the next best thing."

Stella wanted to ask why she was bandaged, why everything still hurt even within the haziness of being drugged, why a policewoman was the next best thing to a psychologist, why she needed a psychologist at all. If the police actually wanted to help her, they would give her a monthly stipend and the assurance that this man would never find her again. There was no use in sending a well-dressed woman who couldn't give her what she needed.

But this woman could express greater detail to a nurse than Stella could, so Stella forced three more letters.

"I know that one," Jo said about the first letter, "and...the second. What? Are you asking _ what? _ "

Stella wasn't, so she spelled the word out again, tried to mouth the word. Despite the attempted clarifications, Jo furrowed her brow, gave, "I'm sorry. I don't know what you're saying. I can try to-"

Jutting her hand toward Jo, Stella grabbed the woman's arm, left a smudge of dried blood on the woman's silky sleeve. Eyes wide, Jo looked to Stella, was concerned and frightened by what this girl could mean as she placed Jo's hand over her upper thigh. 

"I'm sorry," Jo gave, shaking her head, "I really-"

But Stella saw the way that Jo's face fell at the revelation, the fear turning to seriousness.

"May I?" Jo asked, pointing to the blanket over Stella's body.

Stella reached out to tap her hand once, so Jo lifted the blankets off of Stella's lap, found the bloodstain between Stella's legs.

"I'll find a nurse," Jo said calmly, coolly, while Stella forced herself to stare at the ceiling.

_ This is what you wanted anyway, _ Stella tried to tell herself even as her eyes grew wet.  _ This is what you'd wanted all along. _

But as Jo returned, Stella found that all of this, every part of it, was so far from what she'd wanted.


	8. Interlude: Skirts

On her first day of classes the next semester, Bedelia only had to endure so much French before her free hour, in which she could go to the library, wander through the stacks, idle in the Russian section that, if she moved a Dostoevsky to the right, allowed for a glance toward the glass door that led into Margaret's classroom. She taught Latin in a room with a chalkboard and a conference table, a few posters regarding language hanging but little decoration set out otherwise; when students were in class, they would sip tea or coffee from handmade ceramic mugs, for Margaret had a hot-pot sitting on her cornered desk, and the girls would rarely take a note, instead speaking conversationally and making Margaret smile while they countered an educated point. Best of all was when Margaret was alone with just one student, repeating the same statements over and over while the student didn't seem to understand, and finally, the student's face would clear, and Margaret's cheeks would go warm, prideful, overwhelmed. Because Bedelia didn't know Margaret's schedule, she'd been carrying around the book all day, trying to sneak in a time to talk.

The class bell rang; Margaret's students left the room; Bedelia acted as if she were genuinely interested in  _ Crime and Punishment _ so that no one would know she'd been staring. All of those girls, they held themselves with a certain kind of quiet confidence, knowing that they were intelligent but feeling humility toward how much they had still to learn. As the pressed down their bunched-up skirts, pulled at their warm stockings, their little boots for the January rain looking stylish rather than awkward, they held grace and poise but childishness in their gaits, a sense that they were the future and that the future was bright and educated. One weekend, Bedelia had heard about certain girls going to Mystic for a shopping trip, and she could only imagine the delicacies, sitting by the seaside and clutching little pink shopping bags while discussing something like, say, Kant, or whatever else these smart girls talked about. Makeup, maybe. Boys, but those conversations would be short and filled with laughter. Books, perhaps. God, but not in the existential sense. Europe, because that was an inevitable topic. Politics, half of it being their fathers' views and the other half being fueled by quiet, girlish empathy that would only truly come out in twenty years when two of them tried to run for senate. Food, or how they ate so little of it. Money, most definitely, but never using that word in the process.

"Hey!"

Bedelia jumped in surprise as she found Margaret alongside her in the Russian section, the woman leaning against the bookshelves and crossing one ankle over the other.

"I was hoping you'd turn up!" She patted Bedelia's shoulder twice. Now, she wore dress-pants and a modest sweater, her shoes flat and not meant for the icy weather outside. Since her vacation, she'd cut her hair to shoulder-length. She didn't wear makeup. "Did you read the book? What did you think?"

"I...did," Bedelia stammered. 

She jutted the copy in her hands out to Margaret, the action making the woman laugh. Taking the book back, Margaret flipped through the pages, bringing all of Bedelia's little imaginings to mind: Margaret in bed laughing along to the ridiculous parts, Margaret in her office taking a little break from the day's stresses, Margaret stuck at a swim meet and pulling the torn-up copy out of her bag for yet another reread. Bedelia knew what it was like to want to stay in the story again and again, to know the words even if they seemed to slip out of her reach on the pages themselves. Back in her dorm room, she kept  _ Black Beauty _ in the bottom of her pants-drawer because the girls had gone through her underwear before, her roommate laughing at how what she'd found there wasn't lacy or bright red. Though her suitcase coming over from England had been lightweight, just enough clothing to get by, shoes shipped over separately, she'd been sure to keep the book with her on the flight, carrying it on, never letting it go. Sometimes, she would keep it in bed with her at night, hiding it inside of her pillowcase so that her roommate wouldn't see. At this point, she swore she could recreate her copy if she ever lost this one, every part of it memorized from the feeling of its fading pages to the scratches across the back-cover, but the idea of ever parting with the copy made her feel tense. She too knew what it was like to want to read the same book over and over again, no need to branch out, the same thing just as wonderful each time.

"I'm glad to hear it," Margaret said, then motioned back toward her classroom. "Want to sit and talk? I don't have a class."

Quickly, maybe too quickly, Bedelia nodded, so Margaret led her to the classroom, a place Bedelia had only seen in passing, a place that had plagued her mind throughout winter break. Margaret casually pulled out a chair by her desk, then went to pour water from the kettle into two cups.

Using a false accent, Margaret asked in a tone like Stella's, " _ How do yew take your tea? _ "

Bedelia managed a smile, then said, "It's alright. I don't need a cup."

"Nonsense." Margaret popped a teabag into each mug. "The question was fake, though. I don't have milk or sugar here. Brings in ants, the maintenance guys say."

She passed Bedelia a mug, to which Bedelia said, "Thank you."

"So." Margaret sat in her desk chair, lounged back, crossed her legs. The position looked equally cozy and uncomfortable. "Was this your first Camus?"

"Yes."

"Probably a depressor, then." Margaret took a sip, as if the tea weren't hot. "Not the sunniest of reads."

"I thought it was funny."

"Is that your kind of book, then? A little dark, a little funny?"

"I think so."

Margaret pulled the book open, flipped to a page with underlined text. At this point, Bedelia had the sentences on that page memorized, had pictured Margaret marking the page just so she could reread it, but nonetheless, she tried not the think of the words as Margaret spoke. 

" _ It was as if that great rush of anger had washed me clean, emptied me of hope, _ " Margaret quoted,  " _ and, gazing up at the dark sky spangled with its signs and stars, for the first time, the first, I laid my heart open to the benign indifference of the universe. _ "

Margaret took a deep breath, the kind that made her sweater bunch up around her ribs, then let it out slowly, blissfully.

"I can't tell you how many times I've read that," Margaret said, shaking her head and placing the book down on her desk. "What's your favorite book?"

Bedelia knew she couldn't say  _ Black Beauty _ because that wasn't what high school girls read.

" _ The Last Man, _ " Bedelia gave, trying to keep an air of sophistication, a sense that she was deeper, somehow, than Margaret's girls in skirts, Latin speakers - was that the correct term? - who knew more about the Dostoevsky novels than that moving one aside granted access to a beautiful, hidden world.  

"Mary Shelley?" Margaret smiled. "Along the lines of Camus, right? Dark and funny."

"I do like Mary Shelley, but I don't find her funny."

"Nothing funny about a mass plague?"

"Nothing funny about being alone."

To that, Margaret hopped her brows. 

"Do you think we've gotten too mechanical?" Margaret asked. "All impersonal and whatnot. Sometimes, I feel as if there's no real connection anymore, and instead, we're all too busy checking ourselves and consuming to realize that none of this is real."

"I'm not sure what you mean by connection."

"You know,  _ intimacy, _ " Margaret gave, "but not  _ that _ kind. No one can go up to anyone and just talk anymore, you know? Saying you're anything other than  _ fine _ is like telling someone there's spinach in their teeth, only you're pointing out spinach in your own teeth, and you're telling them you won't do anything about it. If that makes sense."

"Yeah," Bedelia said even though she wasn't sure it made sense.

"It's better here, though," Margaret said. "I used to teach in a public school, and that was such bullshit. The students barely even read what I assigned. Now, I can sit back and talk with these girls, and we connect. It's symbiotic, this kind of relationship. The way relationships should be."

Bedelia could picture it: herself as one of those girls in the cute skirts, sitting in Margaret's office while they discussed Latin that Bedelia currently didn't know, laughing at some joke in translation, drinking tea and passing along faded books and being able to read again. For now, she didn't even want to ask Margaret about the markings, wanted to save that for another day, for a time when it rained again and she was once more stuck in the Russian section wishing to cross a threshold that was never meant to be hers. There was nothing in her rooming arrangements, nothing in her French lessons, nothing in trying to memorize the first few lines of  _ The Canterbury Tales _ in Old English, but there was something in how this woman sat across from her and embraced her exactly as she was, letters moving from the page and all. There was something about being around someone who actually wanted to know Bedelia rather than someone who wanted her to act differently, move differently, be interested in different things, do things she knew she couldn't do.

"You're in your second year, right?" Margaret asked.

"Yes," Bedelia gave.

"Are you going to try to specialize in language?" Margaret asked. "Drop something for that?"

Bedelia wanted to drop mathematics, but Madam Beaumont had said math - not  _ maths _ , oddly enough - was good for girls, as were vitamins, gentlemen, and canned vegetables. 

"I think so," Bedelia said. "I'd like to drop math."

"Math," Margaret said, laughing. " _ Maths. _ "

At that, Bedelia laughed too but didn't know why exactly she should laugh. 

"Well, if you ever want to take up Latin, I've got plenty of spots in my classes," Margaret said. 

But they were past a point when Bedelia could enroll, and she knew better than to ask Madam Beaumont to switch languages -  _ et tu, Delia? _ \- but when it came time to sign up for winter sports, she found herself moving away from the list for those in ballet and opting for the list headed by  _ Coach: Margaret Carroll _ , putting her name beneath they junior and senior swimmers who had made state records last year. When she and her sister were little, their father used to take them to the pool at his club, and in the early mornings, long before school began, they would swim the lanes together, never formally, always playfully, and sometimes, he would splash Bedelia and make her angry, but other times, she would give in to the experience and laugh, and it would feel as though she had a place within the family, but then, he would go back toward Stella, pay her more attention, and the feeling would vanish. She knew that neither of them had been wanted, but it felt strange to be the less wanted of two unwanted children. Shouldn't there be some law stating that all unwanted children were equal in their unwantedness? Stella didn't deserve him if Bedelia didn't get him too.

By the time she pulled on her swimsuit in the girls' locker room - the only locker room, of course, except for the visiting boys' one kept for invitationals and mostly used for unsanctioned sex otherwise, always with a boy involved - she found herself oddly confident in what she did, no shame in letting the other girls see her body even if she herself kept her eyes at the floor the whole time, a sense of power exuding from her fingertips and toes as she set up to dive into a lane. Time began; she knew these motions deep in her body, the muscle memory helping her turn her thoughts off, and by the time she found herself back where she began, the other girls far behind her, she smiled softly, the look almost sinister. She couldn't make varsity because of unspoken agreements of social hierarchy, but that meant she would be the example at practice, the one to whom everyone looked for guidance. She would be good again.

And in her first meet, she would perform to the perfectionist degree that she'd never manage to meet for herself before, and when she pulled herself from the pool, Margaret would be there, tapping her wet shoulder, telling her  _ holy shit _ and other pleasantries that weren't exactly socially acceptable. When Bedelia returned to her dorm building, her roommate would complain that the whole room smelled of chlorine, and Bedelia would wear that scent as a badge of honor. Six-in-the-morning practice was a form of worship when there was someone to swim to rather than something to swim away from, and she could go through her days feeling like a fluke, a waste of space, an idiot, so long as she could wake up again to find Margaret waiting for her - and the others, but to some degree just her - at the pool.

By their February break, Bedelia was being recruited to replace injured girls on varsity, swimming in meets above her level while Margaret coached her through events she didn't typically swim. After one of those meets, as the girls piled back into the vans that had taken them to the meet, Margaret took a seat next to Bedelia, pulled a book from her bag.

"I can tell, you know," Margaret said, opening the book and pointing to the clear highlights. "I can help you with that."

With a new book for a new break in her hands, Bedelia smiled.


	9. Interlude: Vanilla

****

As it always would be, her first line of defense was food. Though people and agendas and schedules were all challenging to control, food wasn't, so after the dilation and curettage, she stopped eating. When the nurses she tried spoon-feed her, she would refuse, and if they forced, she would spit at them, mustering all of the muscular strength she could manage in the process. She wasn't even sure if she was sad despite how the gynecologist had told her that that was a typical symptom for those  _ in her situation, _ the word of diagnosis going unspoken while Jo, standing in the corner of the room and staring down at her feet, cringed at the evasion. However, she didn't need some concrete reason for not eating because in her opinion, she was the textbook  _ don't fuck with _ case, the one who could get away with anything, the one whose rebellion would be met with a pat on the back and an  _ I understand, honey _ even though they could never understand. If she screamed and vomited and punched her doctors and scratched at the eyes of others - that was a good technique, she'd heard, for eyes were fragile, and we don't realize how much we rely on them until they're ours no more - then she wouldn't be judged as though she were any other woman. No, she was  _ battered, _ that being the word that the nurses used when they thought she couldn't hear them chatting, and she'd miscarried, though they would never say that word, so her tragedy outweighed her actions. She could get away with anything.

But she couldn't  _ do _ anything, not with the neck brace keeping her stationary, not with her inability to speak, not with the swelling in her hands as the bluish bruises on her knuckles turned to angry purple and resigned yellow. Instead, she could only stare at the ceiling, keep time with the changes in nursing shifts, judge the weather based on what Jo said as she walked back into the room. 

"It's snowing," Jo gave with a soft smile, the kind that meant  _ I know that knowing that makes nothing better, but I figure it's still nice to hear. _ "Just a little. Fat flakes, though they're not sticking. Pretty."

She pulled off a light coat, hung it over the big chair the nurses had dragged in on the night she'd slept over, drew the same wheeled stool from the first day toward Stella. Since she'd left, she must have showered, her hair looking damp, and she wore comfier clothes, flat shoes and no silk this time. Her purse was on her lap, closed so that Stella couldn't see what was inside. 

"I brought you something," Jo gave, then pulled a CD player from her bag. "Headphones too. I just felt that you must be bored."

Bored? Though she was bored, there was a certain occupation in how her time in the hospital had been spent, the boredom punctuated by bursts of inconsolable fear, the kind that meant Jo would try to calm her with a soft touch and a couple of  _ you're safe now _ kinds of statements, but it was only when a nurse came in with some kind of drug that Stella felt the terror subside. Sometimes, Stella would hear the nurses talk about her case when they thought they were far enough away for her not to hear, and from that, she knew that the man was being kept in this same hospital, on a different floor but in the same hospital nonetheless, and his injuries were extensive, not incurable but extensive nonetheless, and there were cops outside of his room at all hours, not many but cops nonetheless. Apparently, the man had lost vision, though they would never say just how much. Despite how he was both literally and figuratively chained to his bed, Stella still could picture him walking into her room late at night, the nurses ignoring him as he walked by, his hands coming around her neck before she could figure out an escape route. In her hospital room, there weren't any windows or cigar boxes; here, she was cornered, and when he started to choke her, there wouldn't be anything she could do to stop him.

"I don't know what you like," Jo gave as she set the player alongside Stella's hand on the bed, "so I just brought some stuff from home. Generic stuff, you know? Well, maybe not  _ generic _ , per se, but it's...popular, that kind of thing."

Jo held up one CD, a classical music one intended for falling asleep. 

"Fit the current mood?"

Stella tapped the bed twice.  _ No. _

"Me neither," Jo gave with a little laugh. Then, she held up some Beach Boys. "What about this one?"

Stella tapped once. She'd never really heard of them, but she liked the sound of  _ beach; _ Jo pulled the CD's case open, pressed it into the player, plugged in headphones. Gently, she brought the headphones over Stella's head.

"The volume's right here," Jo said, pointing the buttons out on the player. "It's quiet right now."

Jo hit play.

"I'll be right back, okay?" Jo said as she gave Stella's wrist a gentle squeeze. "Enjoy."

As "Don't Worry Baby" played, Stella watched Jo leave the room, head out toward the nurses' station, but when Jo approached a nurse with conviviality, with a  _ you wanted to talk? _ kind of gesture, Stella forced her gaze back up to the ceiling. Now, all she could do was listen to the song while they distantly said things like  _ they're thinking about tubing her _ , to which Jo responded,  _ is that really necessarily? _ Of course it would be necessary. The last three times they'd offered her food, she'd denied it, and no matter how hungry she felt, she would keep denying it because she could.  _ We were hoping you could talk to her, _ the nurse said, to which Jo furrowed her brow, asked,  _ shouldn't one of you mention this to her first? _ It felt good to be hungry, to feel empty, the hollowness in her stomach matching the hollowness in her uterus even if only one had had its contents scraped out with a curette while Stella was fully conscious. Even when they released her, she wouldn't have money for food, not anymore, how could she have been so stupid? You don't blind the person who gives you money. You don't smash his head against a wall when he's the one who keeps you alive.  _ We just thought you would have greater influence, _ the nurse said,  _ because she feels safe with you. _ By the time Stella got back to her decrepit apartment, all of the food - minimal, but enough - would have gone bad, or if it hadn't, she would throw it all away anyway, never look at it again, maybe send her bedsheets and clothes down the garbage chute as well. She wanted to tear something apart. She wanted to do something, anything, even just stand up and walk to the bathroom on her own. She wanted to scream until her throat felt so raw that these injuries paled in comparison.

_If she feels safe with me, then I absolutely shouldn't go behind her back and manipulate her,_ Jo said confidently but casually, as though such a thing were the most common of knowledge. _I'm not going to force her into something she's uncomfortable with._ _She's had enough of the will of others. She can't even speak for herself right now. If there's something wrong, it's your job to investigate it, not mine._

_ And what exactly is your job here? _ the nurse asked Jo.

Stella turned the volume up on the CD player and closed her eyes.

* * *

 

In her defense, Stella had tried at dinner, had let a nurse spoon cold soup into her mouth, had stopped after only a few mouthfuls but had made an effort nonetheless. As the night went on, she could feel those aching mouthfuls deep in her stomach, the wretched nausea bringing tears to her eyes, the inadequacy of her own body feeling staggering even in this state.  _ There's no coming back from this, _ she told herself, for she didn't think there was, not with her body feeling so weak, not with thoughts of the man pressing his thumbs into the hollow of her neck keeping her awake at night. In the most basic of terms, she couldn't live like this, not when the smallest of actions required so much effort, not when there was so much healing to do, not when her future was impossible to comprehend. Could she even do school after this? One of the doctors had said that the damage to her voicebox had the potential of being permanent, so there was a chance that she would never speak properly again. Who could be an academic while constantly fighting against her circumstances? People who couldn't sleep at night because they imagined themselves being choked didn't publish influential articles that made the world think more compassionately or more diversely. No one else was going to care, unless they confused the definition of  _ care _ with that of  _ pity. _ No matter how hard she tried, she wouldn't be able to go back to her old self, to the naive one who didn't think of money, to someone who could eat a whole meal without fearing its origins. 

_ I could put rat poison in his food, _ she'd thought while picking through a plate of fish-and-chips, one of his favorites. Staring at him across the table, she thought,  _ if I put it into something rich, he'll absolutely never notice. _

Midway through the night, she forced herself up, her neck sending shooting pains all the way, and with one gauzed finger, she reached back into her throat, made herself sick, vomit staining the linoleum floors. Because the nighttime nurses were chatting, they didn't hear, and they wouldn't find it until morning, not out of incompetence but because of Stella's knowledge of this. If you want an empty stomach,  _ this _ is what you do, and you do it in a certain way so that he doesn't hear you in the next room and ask what's wrong; you do it so that his every action doesn't make you feel like you're about to do  _ this, _ and you do it so that, when he shoves his cock into your mouth, you don't do  _ this _ directly onto him. You do  _ this _ for protection, not destruction. After  _ this _ , you can sleep, but never before.

She woke the next morning to the sound of Jo coming in, setting her purse down on the big chair, leaving her coat behind, dragging her stool up to Stella. In the nighttime hours, someone must've noticed the vomit and cleaned it up. In Jo's hands, she held a cup of ice cream, the kind of vanilla soft-serve that was in every advert for summertime fun. In a bland hospital room during the winter, the cup looked almost shockingly out-of-place, like a piece of the 1960s brought into the next millennium. Though Stella knew such an idea was ridiculous, part of her thought  _ that looks wrong because it's supposed to be in a cone _ anyway.

"I know this is hard for you," Jo gave, her tone sounding smaller, more afraid, like it had as she'd asked questions on the night of the D-and-C while the gynecologist walked Stella through what the procedure would entail, "and I can't imagine what's going on in your mind right now, but they want to put you on a feeding tube. I tried to talk them out of it, but they're not budging."

Jo met Stella's eyes, had a certain desperation on her face, the sense of empathetic fear.  _ I have been here,  _ the look said,  _ and I would be a monster if I didn't keep you from going down my own path. _

"It's uncomfortable, really uncomfortable," Jo gave, "and it's violating. It hurts. I hated every second."

She looked down at the cup, stirred it a bit with a little spoon. _ No, _ Stella thought,  _ don't ruin it. That's such a perfect swirl. _

"I don't even know if you like this stuff," Jo said, shaking her head, looking shy and uncomfortable. "I hoped it would be soft enough. It was this or chocolate, and...I should have asked."

_ No, no, _ Stella wanted to say, but she couldn't speak, and even if she could, she doubted Jo would hear her meaning anyway.

"Just a little bit, okay?" Jo asked. 

She dipped the spoon in, came up with exactly that  _ little bit, _ and leaned toward Stella's hospital bed.

"I know it's hard," Jo gave, holding the spoon toward Stella's lips, "but I know you can do it. I know this is easier than the tube."

Going almost cross-eyed staring at the spoon, Stella took a rib-aching breath, could smell the sweet sugar and cream, knew that taste so well. When she and her sister had been young, they would vacation to the coast, or to another country that was only a short flight away, and because their mother would never give them enough change for two ice creams, they would split one cone on the beach, alternating licks and complaining about who took more. They would sit by the seaside with their cone - a swirl, most often, because Bedelia found all-chocolate to be too overwhelming while Stella thought all-vanilla was something that boring girls got - and be silent, save for the sounds of passing back-and-forth a treat that they couldn't have back home. Once, a boy had come by and swatted their cone to the ground, and at their ages, it was acceptable for Stella to cry but not for Bedelia to do the same, so instead, Bedelia went to the boy's mother, explained the situation astutely, got enough change for another cone and told Stella that it could all be hers. _ No, _ Stella had said,  _ because without you it won't be special. _ Though the memory felt self-aggrandizing, she'd meant the statement, for ice cream alone was just ice cream, but ice cream with her sister was ice cream with love.

She took the spoon between her lips, pulled the ice cream onto her tongue, and swallowed. 


	10. Interlude: Varsity

It was different to not be in a pool. Other than the times Bedelia went in the ocean on family vacations, she'd never swum in open waters, lakes or streams or even rivers like this one. Beyond the abject discomfort of the bacteria, the larvae, the ecosystem, she disliked not being able to see her own legs when she stopped to tread water, and the slightest touch of something in the depths made her lose concentration, her breathing being put off, her rhythm dismantled. Worst of all, Cassandra Elliot, fucking  _ Cassie _ , the varsity bitch whose spot Bedelia craved, couldn't keep a decent tangent around the slightest of curves; her toes would smack Bedelia's thigh, and had this been a dry-land practice, Bedelia would've pulled out a curse or seven, likely in succession, likely with a push at the end. But, of course, this wasn't a dry-land practice.

In a small school kind of agreement with the nearest all-boys academy, the boys' crew team began to pair up with the elite swimmers without a spring sport from Bedelia's school and carpooled to the Connecticut River, boats mounted on top of vans by boys whose shirts would be gone in seconds and then put right back on as a coach - Margaret or the handsome-but-a-father Coach Beverly, whose shoulders were thick with muscle and whose voice was deep and threatening when he shouted commands - told them to piss off. Of course, a few of the girls would fawn just a little, making Bedelia want to roll her eyes. She could see the appeal, of course, and she knew that she liked men, but teenage boys, particularly wealthy teenage boys, had the objective depth of a finger-bowl at dinner, and to Bedelia, a person needed more than a youthful metabolism and advanced placement classes to be interesting.

Up ahead - after Bedelia hit a reed, she glanced forward, her timing already off, Cassie still too close alongside her - Bedelia could see the boys' boat, could hear the vague and watery echoes of a coxswain echoing _ stroke...stroke _ , could feel the putter of Margaret's little motorboat alongside them, another coach from Bedelia's school manning the team clipboard while Margaret, in her own suit and toting a sausage-looking lifeguard buoy, focused on the girls. They were going for two miles, a long swim kind of day, the weather warm for May and the roster for varsity growing tighter and tighter. If Bedelia could beat Cassie's long-distance times consistently - or at least show a greater aptitude for the distance, Cassie's distance, a distance Bedelia didn't typically swim - then she was surely on the team. It was easy to find the weak link, the one who was always overcompensating, the one who kept blonde Herbal Essences on hand and knew just how to keep her hair from turning green each season, and beat her. What Bedelia had found was that life wasn't about aptitude so much as comparable success. You don't have to be great; you just have to be better. Giving a silent  _ fuck off _ to the reeds, Bedelia kicked forward, found the power she needed, tapped into that dry-land weight training, pulled her fingers together, solidified her form while Cassie went lazy with her own. Because tomorrow was a rest day, Bedelia could spend herself here, use the next day as a time to catch up on homework - and on  _ Mrs. Dalloway, _ featuring Margaret's colored films and highlights - while her exhausted muscles felt the effects of every movement she'd made.

Their makeshift finish was where the boys docked, and as Bedelia met the gaze of guys in tight shorts and tops, all aerodynamic and strangely cut, she had to force breath into her lungs, her legs achy and jellying as she began to tread water, but looking behind her, Cassie and the other girls were lengths upon lengths back. Of course, it had been a long swim, one of the longest Bedelia had ever completed, so the sheer completion of such a thing merited congratulations, but Bedelia had been  _ first. _ If she wasn't on the varsity roster, it would be obvious to all that such a thing didn't happen as a result of incompetence. Trying to catch her breath, she imagined seeing Cassie's name in place of hers on the roster and sharing that look with the girl, that _ knowing _ , that sense that Cassie was only there because she was going into her final year, that sense that Bedelia was  _ better _ and that everyone knew Cassie was a fluke. Though social order had always confused Bedelia, she liked this version of it, this logic. She liked that she never had to be perfect; she just had to be better. Even if she wasn't good at being perfect, she knew exactly how to be  _ better. _

The other girls caught up; they pulled up onto the docks, sat there for a long while, took water from Margaret and the other coach, pulled at their caps. As always, the little  _ team debriefing _ went on for much longer than was absolutely necessary, with boys not paying attention and girls making kissy-faces -  _ gross _ \- at them, and by the time they were all piling back into the vans, Bedelia's suit was nearly dry, her whole body aching with exhaustion, her sweatshirt and pants damp in certain areas and growing uncomfortable. As always, Margaret sat alongside her, letting Bedelia take the window seat.

"You don't have to push yourself so hard," Margaret gave, not in a patronizing way but in an understanding way. It was like being a mother and watching another woman give birth; the pains weren't yours, but you could still feel them with a reminiscent acuteness, a knowing feeling that had faded with time but only slightly. "We don't time long swims. You know that."

Bedelia shrugged, even that action hurting.

"I just wanted to be done," she gave even though that was far from the truth.

"You're not going to make varsity if you just want to be done," Margaret said honestly.

Bedelia took a deep breath, let it out slowly, with annoyance. She just wanted to go home, shower, and take tomorrow as a rest day. She didn't want to have to think about any of this.

"That's what you want, right?" Margaret asked though Bedelia could tell the question was rhetorical. "To make varsity?"

"Of course it is," Bedelia said. In time, her accent had begun to fade into something more practiced and American, the result of pretending English was a second language; after listening to how the other girls spoke, she took their tones into her mouth, formed her lips around their strange  _ r _ sounds, made herself more neutral within this country. Though she still slipped back into more English - English-English, not American-English - speech, it was infrequent enough that girls had stopped making fun of how she said  _ car-park _ or  _ maths _ . Now, she could say _ of course _ and pronounce that Americanized  _ r _ like a local.

"Then don't over-exert yourself," Margaret gave. "This is your off-season. What you need to do now is train and keep the faith. Then, varsity's yours, but only then."

So she went back to her dorm, hung her suit to dry, heard her roommate's river-smell complaints, used Margaret's colored films so that she could finish her reading in  _ The Canterbury Tales _ , went over the translation Madam wanted her to do, picked up  _ Mrs. Dalloway _ , reordered her desk. Her life could be divided into three separate phases: school, sports, and Margaret. Oftentimes, Margaret overlapped in the other categories: her insistence that Bedelia drop math in favor of Latin, her extraneous practices, the times Bedelia spent in Margaret's office doing homework and drinking tea while Margaret herself read. Outside of those phases of life, she felt aimless, unsure, uncomfortable, and it wasn't until she was running with Margaret that Tuesday that things felt normal again. 

Margaret had a Walkman and a pair of shitty headphones that she would always bring on their longer runs, and with the headphones slung around her sweaty neck, she played that popular German song too loudly off of a mixtape. An inconsistent beat, something hard to run to. Filled with lines about balloons.

"So," Margaret said, slowing their matched pace. These were called  _ fartleks, _ a Swedish name that didn't translate particularly well, and the two of them were in their few minutes of easy jogging in between near-sprints. At the moment, they were on a hilly road. "What're you doing this summer?"

"Going home," Bedelia gave. "We might go to the coast. I don't know."

"Not much communication?"

"My father is very ill."

"Oh." Margaret paused, her gait off. "You never told me."

"It's recent," Bedelia lied. 

"You know you can tell me that stuff, right?"

"Yeah, I know." She'd picked up  _ yeah _ from Margaret. Saying the word in between French sentences drove her mother barking mad. 

"I'm here for you and whatnot. It's hard to be your age and so far from home."

"Yeah," Bedelia gave noncommittally. 

"Just...keep me in the loop, okay? I don't want you to feel like you're all alone."

Margaret's watch beeped with their time. Now, they had to sprint. Right in time, the song on the Walkman changed to a synthy Van Halen song, so Bedelia laughed, sped up, gave, "Your music taste is  _ shit _ ."

For Bedelia's birthday, Margaret gave her a Walkman and two tapes, one by Tracy Chapman and one that was completely in Russian, the text incomprehensible, but as Bedelia listened, she found that it was a pianist playing Debussy. Her parents sent a nice pair of shoes.

In May, they lay on a big beach towel of Margaret's by a lake in which they'd claimed to the school's administration they would be training. They sipped iced tea from the water bottles they used while working out and listened to muffled Indigo Girls off of a radio Margaret had brought. Since joining the swim team, Bedelia put on somewhere around five pounds of muscle, and their version of a celebration was doing this: being horizontal, soaking in the sun, going far enough from campus that it all felt like a real escape. As Bedelia stared up at the clouds, few and far between but bright and moving across the skyline with leisurely ease, she felt as though her exams - a translation for Madam, an English paper she'd yet to start, something in math that she very much didn't understand - were on another continent, like her sister and father, like her mother, like a majority of the things troubling her. While most girls went on and on about their summers, gushing about beaches and boys and being warm, all Bedelia could think of was how her father was on oxygen now, of the struggle she'd have to find a pool, of how she would probably need to bring her sister with her. Even now, with her muscles heavy and her body relaxed, she still could hear the lap of the water in front of them, and she still wanted to dive in, this time with Margaret alongside her, this time matching their paces, this time pulling up on a bank just far enough away from the rich lake houses that they could feel isolated, like they were observers rather than participants, like they could speak without speaking. Then again, she liked watching Margaret swim better, the way her arms pulled at the water, how graceful she was even while rushing to finish a lap, the look of her taking her cap off and letting two little braids fall out. 

Maybe best of all was being here while Margaret read alongside her - some Shelley, probably a reread, while Bedelia had  _ Black Beauty _ in her bag but wouldn't take it out - and letting life happen, neither of them participating, both of them escaping. The radio changed songs as an announcer spoke in a thickly American accent -  _ and to our fourth caller, we'll give a voucher for one large pizza at Bianchi's! _ \- and the breeze brought Margaret's hair across her face, sticking in her lip balm. Reaching out, Bedelia pressed Margaret's hair away and back behind her ear, made Margaret laugh lightly.

"I have hands too," Margaret said.

"Yeah, but you're comfy." She sounded American enough at this point, her speech within the kind of neutral New England tone that practiced every single day. 

"I was. I  _ am, _ " Margaret gave, then shifted position, sat up on her forearms, looked down at Bedelia. "You've been quiet."

"I'm comfy too."

"Suspiciously quiet."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Too English. It always came back when she was nervous, when her guard was down. 

"I don't know." Margaret shrugged but held a knowing glance. "It seems like something's on your mind."

"Yeah?" Bedelia tried to brush it off.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"About what?" she smirked.

Margaret reached out to playfully punch her arm, then gave, "I just worry about you sometimes. You don't like to talk about anything other than school or sports."

"I don't do much other than school or sports."

"Then what is it we're doing right now?"

"Sports, if you ask the administration."

"Oh, bugger off."

Bedelia looked back up at the sky, the clouds from before extending farther across the sky, time passing, the sun shifting above. Though she liked this lack of participation, this removal, time persisted nonetheless, and they would have to return eventually, and she had a flight booked, not even a round trip; she was going back to England, and she was going back alone. She didn't have a driving license, and in her bedroom at home, she still had her horseback ribbons hung like a prepubescent girl would, like an immature bitch would, and even with her uppity roommate, she still liked her dorm room better, or even Margaret's classroom, or even Margaret's couch, a place she'd stayed a few times after their makeshift practices while Margaret whipped up some kind of shared protein smoothie in her decrepit, soon-to-die blender. Back home, there would be no sweaty runs, no long swims in the river, no bringing her high-marked English papers to Margaret with the biggest grin; instead, she would have her father, her sister, her mother. And the horses, of course, but now, her horse felt so far away, like a rotting limb to be amputated, like a childhood memory that was inaccessible in the adult world. Adult world? She was sixteen, but childhood niceties seemed a lifetime away, as if the person she'd been before moving to the United States had been so disgustingly naive that she would repress that part of her history, deny that it had ever existed. At this point in her life, she wasn't supposed to feel so old and afraid.

"I don't want to go home," Bedelia gave, the admission making her sweat uncomfortably. 

Margaret reached out, rubbed Bedelia's shoulder.

"Why's that?" she asked.

The wind was soft against the nearby trees, all budding, all looking as though fall and winter had been some kind of cruel but reversible prank; Margaret's hands were always so soft, her fingertips a bit calloused but her skin warm and moisturized. 

Bedelia took a deep breath, gave, "I think my father's dying."

"But you don't know?"

"No one will tell me, but I know," Bedelia gave. "They're trying to protect my sister, I think. They think we can't handle it."

"You have a sister?"

_ Oh. _

"Yes," Bedelia gave, the sweat growing more uncomfortable.

"How old is she?"

"Fourteen."

"Are you both close with your father?"

"She is." 

Margaret nodded, then looked out toward the lake, at the long lengths of trees, at the little houses with docked boats and dogs in the yards. Quintessentially American, Bedelia figured; she could picture living in a place like this, having a husband and children, swimming every morning at the break of day, but despite the seeming allure of that image, Bedelia couldn't exactly put herself there, living that easy life, being with those easy people. Though she could see those things happening, she couldn't see herself as being a part of them, as being immersed. Instead, those things would happen around her, and she would continue feeling like this. She wasn't sure there was a way out.

"I don't know what to tell you," Margaret gave. "There's nothing I can say that'll make it better. I'm sorry."

"It's alright," Bedelia gave, flustered. 

Then, Margaret leaned back down onto the blanket, opened up her arms, pumped her hands in a  _ come here _ motion. Furrowing her brow, Bedelia looked on in confusion, so Margaret rolled her eyes, gave, "Psychologists say that physical contact alleviates fear. It's science, not some  _ au natural _ mumbo-jumbo. C'mere."

To her own surprise, Bedelia complied, moved over toward Margaret; Margaret wrapped her arms, thick with muscle and tanned in the sun from their workouts, around Bedelia, and beneath the late-spring sun, Bedelia let her eyes close, tried to focus on the way Margaret's skin felt against her own, let herself match her breathing in time with Margaret's. Though she wanted to say she hadn't imagined this before, she'd imagined it countless times, usually at a sports banquet, maybe after a particularly hard meet, but nonetheless, she'd imagined it, Margaret's arms around her, the embrace a second in length but an embrace nonetheless. Sometimes, she'd wanted to put herself in Margaret's way so that it would happen by accident, maybe in a goodbye for the summer, maybe after a particularly good English paper, maybe in the case that they were incidentally on the same flight again. But this was better than the imaginings because Margaret didn't let go. Bedelia didn't have to control anything. Instead all she had to do was be there, her face against Margaret's skin, the world a springtime kind of silent around them: the sounds of birds, swaying trees, lapping water, distant people who would never matter to them. On the radio, Jeff Buckley played just quietly enough to enhance the moment, not deaden it, and on this beach, during this time when the administration thought they were swimming, in this year of her life when her father would die, they were the only people around, and nothing mattered to them other than the current moment, the feeling of each other's breath, the notion that there was comfort intended in this gesture. 

Bedelia had thought about it before, her attraction to Margaret, her notion of what they had together, and naturally, she'd brought about images, ones of kissing and ones of a gentle but knowing caress like the ones in movies, but those mental scenes with Margaret were nonsensical, nothing to aspire to. No matter how greatly Bedelia was drawn to this woman, she knew that there was nothing romantic in that draw, and she knew that Margaret realized that as well. Instead, Margaret offered her understanding, and she offered Margaret camaraderie, a laugh, French knowledge as Margaret struggled through learning the language, a little friend. 

_ I want to be a mother, _ Margaret had said in conversation weeks beforehand,  _ but I don't know if I'll ever get around to it. _

_ Why not? _ Bedelia had asked. Tea had been sitting on the table in Margaret's office; Bedelia had been struggling through a translation for Madam.

_ Because there's no time, really, _ Margaret had given. _ And because I have no one to have kids with. And because I'm just not sure I could do that to a person. _

_ Do what? _ Bedelia had asked.

_ I don't know, _ Margaret had said.  _ Be responsible, I guess. Guarantee that I'd love them forever, even if they ended up being a serial killer. _

_ That's not what it means to be a parent, _ Bedelia had said, the statement making Margaret laugh.

_ Sometimes, I feel like you're my version of that, _ Margaret gave.  _ Like God or whoever was telling me to piss off with the whole kid thing and offered you up as an alternative. But in the end, it's like a movie in which the alternative turns out to be better, because you're smarter than me from the get-go. No dealing with sleep depravity, no birthing process, no nothing. Just someone who schools me in French every day. It's better. _

"I'm going to miss you," Bedelia said, her voice sounding small, childish, uncouth and horribly honest.

"I'm going to miss you too, B."

On the day that Bedelia's flight left for the summer, they both woke at five that morning, and Margaret drove them in her aging sedan back to the same lake, the two of them clad in personal buoys for safety, Bedelia's suit a borrowed two-piece because all of her other ones were packed. They only went a mile - short, by their current standards - and banked themselves aimlessly on the beach, hair in the sand, rivulets of water falling across their faces like raindrops when you've forgotten your umbrella. 

"I'm going to make varsity in the fall," Bedelia said between panting breaths, as if to change a subject despite their lack of conversation.

At that, Margaret tiredly laughed, glanced over at Bedelia. Their eyes met, warm brown to soft blue, bare faces that would never need to be covered up, a sense that one body had been split into two only for each half to find one another again. Bedelia hated how acute it felt to know that these would be their last moments together until September.

"Yeah," Margaret gave, "you better."


	11. Interlude: Sweater

They put Stella into a lighter, more mobile neck brace while Jo wasn't there. Now, Stella could walk to the bathroom on her own. Though her hands were still hard to move, she could at least form a fist, the smallest of retaliations. Without her asking, the nurses even brought Stella a slice of chocolate cake - her first solid food - after dinner, a big, thick slice with frosting in between its three layers. Provided that nothing else went wrong, she would be released within a few days.

She didn't feel resilient or ready to leave, so she focused on the hospital instead, on stretching the seconds so that minutes went by agonizingly slowly, in making the most of the time when she could ask for what she needed. Because of her age, her situation, she hadn't a clue of what the bill could be, of how to keep it small, but she knew the bill would go to her mother, that there was nothing Stella could do that would later haunt her finances. She could ask for an extra slice of chocolate cake, and someone would bring it. Though her ribs still hurt, and though she wasn't to speak for at least another few days, she was in her best place since she had been at her boarding school, since the older teachers had taken pity on the girl whose parents abandoned her in one way or another. She would stay in this hospital forever if she could.

When Jo came back, she held a small duffel in her hands and a distant look on her face. Stella could almost smile again, especially when she thought of how great she must look in a different neck brace. Jo would be so proud of how Stella had healed, wouldn't she? As Jo pulled her usual stool toward Stella's bed, Stella could already imagine the excited smile, the pride shown on Jo's lips. 

"Something's happened," Jo gave, looking to Stella with a quiet fear that didn't leave her face for the remainder of the day.

In hospitals, people tended to either heal or not heal. Stella knew she should have seen this coming.

"We had officers outside of his room," Jo said, looking down at her lap, letting the bag fall to the floor. "We were prepared. He could've never gotten to you."

 _Past tense,_  Stella tried to tell her now-racing heart. 

"He undid his restraints last night," Jo gave, "and when our men stationed at his room attempted to subdue him, his retaliation only worsened his injuries. He shouldn't have been out of bed, much less mobile. They think it was a brain bleed."

A bleed, like what made her bathroom trips look mockingly menstrual, like why the nurses forced her to wear gauzy disposable panties from the maternity ward. _I bleed,_  she thought, _and it's never killed me._

"I know you didn't want a psychologist," Jo said, "but we can make one available if need be."

No, no psychologist. Even if Stella could speak, she didn't want to speak to someone like that, someone whose care was merely a transaction though they pretended it wasn't. Psychology was such a flimsy science, its ignorance of culture being written off as objectivity, its highest scholars believing that we all want to fuck our mothers; though Stella would let medical doctors touch her whole body, cold, gloved hands skimming her bare inner thighs while her mind detached herself from her legs, she wouldn't let someone whose science hinged on the denial of basic humanities come near her. She had no use for someone who saw her mind as only a diagnosis.

"The nurses said you could get out of the room, if you like," Jo said, meeting Stella's gaze with a nod of finality. _Onto a better subject._  "I brought you some clothes."

Jo picked at the duffel, unzipped its top, pulled out a lilac-colored sweater, the material cashmere. Soft.

"They say the gown has to stay on, but they wouldn't comment if we tried to cover it." Jo left the sweater on her lap; Stella's gaze followed the garment intently. "A few floors up, there's some nice windows overlooking the countryside. Closest thing I could manage to warm fresh air."

With her right hand - still bruised, not swelling, never needing to form a fist - she reached out, touched Jo's hand once. Softly, Jo smiled, then pressed the call button, waited as the all-knowing nurse brought in a wheelchair - no legs was better than no nothing, and even though she would never mention it, Stella found the cuts on her feet, a result of climbing barefoot through a broken window, incredibly painful to walk on - and helped Stella sit up. _I can do it,_  she wanted to say, so she pressed her palms down against the bed, forced herself up in a way she hadn't been able to on her first day in this room. Thankfully, the nurse backed off, gave a small and knowing smile. _Feels good, huh?_

"Have you got it?" the nurse asked Jo, to which Jo nodded, so the nurse left as Stella brought her legs off of the side of the bed, her feet dangling, her back upright. 

Jo unbuttoned the sweater, brought one arm of the garment toward Stella so that the two of them could get it on her together. As Jo's thin fingers took to the buttons, Jo said, "It's really pretty up there. I sat there during a sunrise while you were sleeping. Beautiful."

Jo smoothed down the arms of the sweater, touched Stella so gingerly that as Jo's hands moved away, Stella wanted to reach out and bring them back, say _no, please stay,_  sit there with that connection until she felt that the passing time had honored this feeling. When she thought about leaving the hospital, leaving Jo, she could feel anxiety deep in her belly, the response visceral and horrified. What would she do? Go back to school? How could she go back to school now? How would she pay for food, for rent? Would she even be able to eat?

She couldn't do this alone, not any of it, not the healing or the moving forward or even just the next morning. After Daddy died, Bedelia had called Stella a dependent person, and though the phrase had been meant as an insult, Stella knew that it was true and indifferent: she wasn't a solitary person, was someone who needed others and who, at her most basic level, wanted love more than anything else. Already, she'd tried loving herself, valuing herself, saying _fuck you_  to her mother and sister who stopped answering her calls when she was sixteen, knowing that she'd been loved once and could be loved again, but all of that fell short when even the death of the man whose hands had left bruises and scrapes on her neck didn't make her feel safe. She knew she wouldn't be able to sleep if she had to be alone in her tiny flat, no one watching the door for a dead man walking, no one making sure that she would be fed in the morning. Though healing was a solitary activity, Stella knew she couldn't do it without help.

 _I could say I'm still sick,_  Stella thought. _I could say that I still can't talk, but how would I say that? I could tell the doctors at my university and ask for help. I could tell my professors._  But telling them wasn't real, not in the way she thought it should be; if they ever asked her to verbalize these events, these emotions, she would freeze, but she needed them to know how she felt, to feel it too for just one second so that they would understand how much she needed help. If they understood, they would need to do something, right? But how could they ever understand?

Without thinking, she reached out for Jo, leaned over the edge of the bed, collapsed against Jo's body like she had on that first horrible night. However, she could wrap her arms around Jo this time, pull her closer, smell Jo's sweet vanilla perfume and close her eyes as Jo brought her own arms gently around Stella. 

 _No, please stay,_  Stella asked silently as she exhaled. 

When Jo brought the palm of her hand to the back of Stella's head, holding there gingerly, Stella closed her eyes.

 _Yes,_  Jo said silently, _I will._

* * *

 _People lie,_  Stella thought as a nurse put her into a taxi the next day. If there was one intrinsic truth about human beings, it was that they didn't tell the truth, that they would go against whatever they said because no one ever really valued a statement. She valued truth. In her hands, she clutched Jo's business card. The hospital had long ago given her clothes to the police, replaced them with a pair of scrubs that didn't fit and shoes from the hospital's gift shop. Jo hadn't come back to fetch the sweater, hadn't come back at all, but her card, one with a home phone number scribbled onto the back, had been left behind for further contact. Though Stella wanted to call, she wished she didn't.

The cabbie asked where to. Stella listed off her address, and the cabbie grimaced, said _big fare._  She had three-hundred pounds in the wallet that the police had uncovered and given back to her, plus two hundred that Jo had lifted secretly from the man's wallet. A few of the bills had blood on them. Stella figured she would pay with those, get them out of the way first. 

Her apartment felt naive and innocent in comparison to the way it had looked the last time she'd seen it. A bowl of cereal left on the ground had two flies flitting at its rim. The idea of opening the refrigerator made Stella feel faint. 

Currently, she was missing a class on Boas and Mead. In bed, she picked up the book for that class, flipped through the pages, felt as though the book were unreal, not tangible, something she couldn't hold in her hands like she currently was. She didn't want to read about people, think about people, conceptualize the complicated layering of society and culture within the world around her. _This whole discipline can be summarized by saying that people lie,_  Stella thought, _and that they hate each other, and that they want to hurt each other. That's all._  There was the humanistic perspective, but she had a hard time thinking about the man as a fellow human being, as someone she had killed. Indirectly, perhaps, but if she'd never existed, he would still be alive, wouldn't he? It wasn't as though she had never wished him harm.

In her first week back, she only managed to attend two classes during which she'd silently hyperventilated in the back of the room, the lectures lost on her. Anything, really, could set off her anxiety; sometimes, a man with a particular haircut made her feel as though she were choking, and other times, a deep voice, even that of a woman, would make her tense, her body immovable, her heart rate skyrocketing. When she locked herself away in her flat and tried to read her textbooks, she found herself eyeing the door as though someone would bust in at any moment, and the slightest sound from next door would wake her and send her into high alert, her nights turning horrifyingly sleepless from how the neighbors liked to blast music. She occasionally ate but never cooked, and for now, her fridge held only a six-pack from months ago, old takeaway boxes, and the occasional loaf of bread that she would buy only to prove that she was still capable of shopping.

Though money was easy for the moment, she would watch her hands shake as she passed over quid that his hands had touched, and upon receiving change, she would feel nauseous, uncomfortable with using his money to feed herself, horrified that he would somehow find her and declare that she owed him every bit she'd stolen from him, that he would hear her say that she couldn't pay him back and thus take matters into his own hands. Even if she managed to leave Sainsbury's with milk and some eggs, just enough to make a difference, she would find herself eating small dinners with her stomach in knots, her hand going to the back of her throat by the end of the meal. _See?_  she would think, as if she could communicate with him that way. _It's gone. It's all gone. I'm so sorry._

So, with a near-empty fridge and a feeling that one week of school had been too much, she called Jo using the telephone booth a few blocks away from her flat; Jo didn't pick up. Work hours, Stella figured, then returned home and tried to ignore her racing heart. It wasn't as though Jo could help anyway. If Stella wanted these problems to go away, she would have to go back to the hospital indefinitely, until all men, all money, all shirts that clung to her neck no longer existed; only then could she finish her degree and attend her classes, images on slides no longer evoking such a primal, horrific response. 

The problem with her fear was that it controlled every part of her, and trying to better any one part only made the others worse. If she tried to breathe through the anxiety of being in a classroom, she would feel like her neck was constricting, her airway cut off like it had been as the man had gripped at her skin. On Wednesday, one professor pulled her aside after class and asked about the bruises, inquired as to whether or not she needed help, and that interaction had been enough to send Stella to the nearest bathroom, where she brought her fingers to the back of her throat because overwhelm was easiest to handle when paired with emptiness. If a boy tapped her shoulder and asked for a pen midway through a lecture, she would spend the remainder of the lecture feeling dizzy and disoriented, like the world was ending but only for her. All it took was for one element of her life to be off, and then, she would reach a state of full panic, and that panic would go on until some other kind of other overwhelming emotion intervened.

The first time she cut herself, she had been drunk on vodka purchased with his money, and she'd broken the bottle by accident. At first, the bleeding had only made her more anxious, but then, the euphoria had hit, the numbing that felt like a high, the urgency paired with ecstasy. Later in life, she would find out that it all came down to the release of endorphins, a happy kind of chemical that, like its relative morphine, numbed pain and increased pleasure, but as she stared down, glass in hand, blood seeping from a gash on her thigh, she didn't care what the scientific name was: all that mattered was that the panic stopped. Because she was a smart girl, she studied self-mutilation at her university's library, read the biological studies about cleanliness and proper maintenance, knew how to patch the wounds so long as they didn't pulse blood at her heart's rate. In other places, this was a normal - even celebrated - practice, and the side effects were few, only bloody skirts midway through a lecture or cravings during class making her commute home feel urgent. She didn't have a reason to think this practice was bad, not when it meant she could go to class, not when her worries about money became so much smaller as soon as she ran her sanitized razor blade through her skin. If it meant she could function, then it was a proper way to cope.

Like all addicts, she thought she was in control, but she was never really in control, not so long as she fed the urges, not so long as cutting was her only option. Though she wouldn't remember what brought on the urge, she had a lecture that left her shaking enough to garner concern from other students, and on her commute home, she was buzzing with anxiety, the sensation making the act of putting her apartment's key into the lock feel impossible. In the routine, quotidian way, she sat on the bathroom floor, lifted her skirt, peeled away the dressings left on each leg. The right one was still a bit raw, so she went for the left instead, took a boiled blade to her skin and exhaled through the slash. When she took another breath, she still felt overwhelmed, so she slashed again, waited for that after-running-up-a-tall-hill feeling, waited for the relief to hit. This was taking too long. She pulled the blade through again, this time carelessly, and as she took a deep breath, she could finally feel the beginning of it. Higher pleasure, lower pain. She leaned back against the bathroom wall, closed her eyes, exhaled. She liked the feeling of letting it seep out, of having moments be drawn out between her heartbeats. With a quieter mind, she could think again. With an emptier body, she could breathe again. Maybe it wasn't proper, but it was scientific, logical, exactly what she needed. If she couldn't have help from others, at least she could still help herself.

When she opened her eyes, she cringed; that was more blood than she'd expected. It pooled on the bathroom tiles, pulsation in time with her heartbeats, and she started to panic. Nicked artery. She knew the signs. Based on the medical literature, she was to call an ambulance, apply pressure. She wasn't sure she could stand. Forcing herself onto her better leg, she felt herself grow lightheaded - _this isn't good_  - but managed to stand, sharp pain in her leg, blood falling quickly and sticking in the folds of her skirt. _Phone booth,_  she thought, walking in a dizzying daze toward her apartment's door, toward the building's stairs. Stumbling, she fell against the wall, left a bloodstain on the wallpaper, dripped as she made it to the building's front door. Outside, it was raining, but nonetheless, she could see the phonebooth through the ground floor's window, the booth looking like salvation. 

With rainwater stinging her half-exposed cuts, she forced herself onward, the dizziness making her run into buildings, into other people; by the time she made it to the phonebooth, she needed to lean against the wall in order to keep herself upright. She managed small change from her pocket, shakily forced it into its slot. With her body shaking, both from the cold and from the blood loss, she had trouble dialing the number, shoved the public phone underneath her shoulder, tried to force herself to breathe.

The line was picked up at the other end, and for the first time since they met, Stella spoke to Jo.


	12. Interlude: Takeoff

It had been in a letter, of all things. Looking back, she would think of text messages, of email, of how that summer could've be infinitely more comfortable or perhaps infinitely worse, but nonetheless, the statement came in a letter.

_When is your return flight? I'd like to pick you up from the airport. Maybe we can get lunch._

Thinking of all of her times in school transit, listening to other girls speaking languages she couldn't understand talk convivially while she stared out the window, she wanted to take the offer. She'd been in Margaret's car plenty of times, a part of the passenger's seat poking into the small of her back, the scent something between artificial fresheners and must, a jammed-in Electric Light Orchestra tape - _no, B, you don't understand, they're one of the first bands to bring classical instruments into rock_  - playing the same songs as always, something upbeat, something sweet and turned down whenever Margaret had to make a left turn. Before one early-morning swim, they'd turned "Jungle" all the way up and rolled - literally rolled - the windows down, covering up the sounds of highway, urbanization, sprawl.

"Connecticut is so ugly," Margaret had shouted over the music. "I hate this state. It's just one to drive through."

"That's what people say about New Jersey," Bedelia had shouted back.

"Yeah, but at least there they pump your gas for you."

And though Bedelia knew she was overthinking the situation, she found something so romantic about pulling up to a lake, the car's balding tires running over grass and gravel, the parking break put on in an oceanic wave, the key clicking out of the ignition as the song suddenly fell away. Those were the good moments, the ones worth remembering, the ones in which Margaret's bare skin was illuminated by early-morning sun, her seatbelt clicking out, her glance to Bedelia saying _let's go._

 _Yes,_  Bedelia wrote back, _I'd love it if you could pick me up._

Her suitcase had grown remarkably lighter in the past year, and though her mother had disapproved, she'd started wearing lighter things, American things, tank tops and little shorts and skirts that didn't leave much room for the imagination. Going back, she brought cashmere sweaters and preppy shoes, the kinds of things that the girls here wore but with a foreign twist that they could only emulate. When they inevitably asked her where her boots were from, she would say Harrod's, and they would say _oh, my mother has vintage stuff from there,_  to which Bedelia would say _yeah,_  like an American, _everyone's mother does._  She wore a pair of loose, relaxed trousers - the English edge, something that wouldn't come across the pond for another few months - and a light tee - casual and American, almost anarchist in nature, the perfect pair for a youthful ponytail and French skin. As she lifted her luggage from the carousel, she could see the bulge within her arms, the raw muscle, the soreness left over from an agonizing two and a half miles - yes, she used miles now, much to Stella's disdain - in a pool lane. As she left the airport, she could already feel the breeze that had scuffed her shoulders during long swims on the Connecticut River, even if the air smelled merely like New York City, like taxicabs and summertime body odor and blackened gum in the sidewalks.

Margaret's car was parked right at the arrivals area. Illegally, Bedelia might add. The windows were down, and she was playing a song with sultry cowbell just a little bit too loudly. Bedelia's lips bloomed to a smile as she raced over, gave a breathless _hey,_ watched Margaret pop the trunk - Bedelia could put the suitcase in there herself, obviously - and then, she climbed into the passenger's seat, where Margaret's wide arms awaited her. Though a hug around a console was awkward and uncomfortable, Bedelia felt her heart racing in excitement the whole time, the pain in her hip as Margaret pulled her close drowned out by the feeling of being here again. _Home,_  she thought in the way that rebellious girls did in movies, _my family isn't my home; you are, and no one else is allowed in._

They hit the road, Margaret talking a mile a minute while stuck in New York traffic, the windows rolled down because her car's air conditioning was shit, the American heat casting rays of light onto Bedelia's bare arms. When Margaret asked about the summer, Bedelia tried to change the subject, but ultimately, as they crossed into Connecticut, a few things came out: her sister was in denial of their father's condition, their father was alright for the moment, their mother was the same as always even though Bedelia had never established what _as always_  could mean, Bedelia had managed to keep shape throughout the summer, believing she was coming back stronger.

"You are," Margaret agreed as she didn't signal before getting into the passing lane that was on the wrong side of the road. "You're not in a fall sport, right? I was thinking we could get some practices in, see if other girls are interested."

Cassie, the one whose spot on varsity Bedelia wanted, did soccer in the fall. Softly, Bedelia smiled.

"Yeah, I'd love that," she gave.

"And for Latin, we've got a small class," Margaret said, nodding. Her hair was back in a ponytail, the length longer than before. "It's just you and three others. I think we're going to go in-depth because of it. You know, see what you guys want to learn. I don't want it to be too structured."

"That sounds good," Bedelia said.

"And, more pressing, dinner!" Margaret said. "You must be exhausted. And hungry. Does a restaurant sound okay, or-"

"Whatever you want," Bedelia gave. "I'm not in the mood to choose."

"It's just that I've got some stuff at home, _good_  stuff," Margaret said. "Madam brought back some French bread, stuffed it in her carry-on and everything. Pork loins, herbs, that kind of stuff. Maybe not a summer meal, but I'm sick of gazpacho and whatever."

Provincial herbs, a salad, elegant and understated and French. All they needed was a jasmine candle and a table that sat on a beach for it to be Bedelia's idea of the most perfect meal.

"Yeah, sounds good," Bedelia said.

"But let's get you all unpacked first," Margaret said, then reached into her pocket. She added, "This is your key. Same room, I think. Same roommate?"

"No roommate." Bedelia smiled. "She dropped out over the summer."

" _Right,_ " Margaret said, remembering. "Did they ever find you someone new?"

"Not that I know of."

"Nice, then, a whole bachelorette pad." Margaret laughed.

At the dorm building, Margaret hoisted Bedelia's suitcase up the stairs, let Bedelia unlock the door, and together, they unpacked the whole thing, Margaret's casual shelving of _Black Beauty_  feeling somehow natural, the sheets on the twin bed fresh and the open windows letting in warm summer air, the kind that Bedelia relished in after so many months in rainy England. _This is where I'm supposed to be,_  she thought as Margaret laughed at how she couldn't get a pillowcase to fit properly, dust in the air captured in afternoon light. _This is exactly where I'm supposed to be._

The walk to Margaret's apartment was short and rooted in Bedelia's muscle-memory, and while Margaret slid the loin into the oven, Bedelia opened all of the windows, hoping to air out the place, too much heat trapped inside. Though Margaret's kitchen counters were covered in dishes that needed to be put away - mismatched plates, mugs with Latin jokes or past events written on them, so many forks but only a few spoons - she still managed to find Bedelia a spot to set down a cutting board, fresh vegetables lining the board and looking delectable enough that she would pilfer one or two cuts of carrot or cucumber, laugh at Margaret's claims of _if you eat it all now, there'll be nothing left for dinner!_  On the radio, they played Margaret's favorite local station, one that Bedelia wasn't quite a fan of but one that Bedelia felt fit the atmosphere, each guitar chord sounding like the sun beating down on them, the lyrics about love and life fitting in to their world. By the time dinner was plated, the world outside had grown dark, but out back, there were lights hung over an outdoor table, and while Margaret lit two citronella candles, Bedelia set their plates down. In the fridge, they had ice cream for afterward. Though Bedelia felt jet lag deep in her bones, she pushed those feelings away, wanted just to sit with this woman and laugh, catch up, feel seen again.

They'd gone back inside to watch television, but in the end, Bedelia nodded off instead, sprawled on Margaret's couch and clutching a throw pillow that had some kind of Latin inscription; in the haze of her exhaustion, she could hear Margaret dial a phone number, say _yeah, she's with me, I made her dinner, the jet lag's crazy. She's asleep on my couch. I don't really want to move her. Is that alright?_  And based on how no one came, on how Margaret pulled a light blanket over her and smoothed her hair back, Bedelia figured that that was alright. The lights clicked off, and Bedelia heard Margaret's bedroom door close. Even now, the house still smelled of warm herbs, of summertime heat, of a place where everything was done in extremes, the rain coming in strong bursts and the sun coming back tirelessly afterward. She fell asleep for the night while thinking about what she and Margaret would make for breakfast.

* * *

Margaret set the pamphlet on top of Bedelia's open notebook, making Bedelia leave an inkstain where she'd intended to write a word. 

"I want you to do this," Margaret said, leaning against her classroom's table.

Bedelia picked up the stained pamphlet, one for a distance swim in a distant state. 

"Two miles, timed although we're not going to care about the time," Margaret summarized as Bedelia opened the folds. "You're good, the kind of good that, given enough training and competing, could get you into any college. Traveling to compete is something you'll want on your rap sheet, and early. I'll go with you."

Bedelia looked at the pictures, all pale bodies swimming close together beneath lake water, the look like that of angelfish in the ocean but artificial in comparison. Those people didn't look as if they should be in the water like that.

"If I do it, will I make varsity?" Bedelia asked, looking up at Margaret.

Huffing a laugh, Margaret gave, "If you do it, your spot on varsity will be plated in gold and engraved with your name."

So Bedelia gave Margaret the credit card her mother had offered for emergencies only and let Margaret book them two tickets to Oregon. _Oregon._  Though Bedelia didn't know how to pronounce the state's name properly, she still repeated it to herself, writing it on the calendar in her bedroom, keeping a countdown in her notebooks. _Ten days until OREGON!_  Margaret even gave her a varsity swimsuit, one printed with the school's crest and mascot, a pattern at the French-cut sides; Bedelia now had her own swim-cap with her varsity number on it, the white _26_  on the blue cap so satisfying to run her fingers over. She was _good_ , good enough for varsity, good enough for gear, good enough to pack just a carry-on for her Oregonian weekend. After this, she would be news within her school, and she would have a spot on varsity, Cassie be damned. Depending on who else made the team, she might even be the youngest student to make the cut.

At the airport, the woman at the check-in desk took Margaret's driver's license for inspection, as well as Bedelia's passport, and furrowed her brow at the discrepancies. 

"Is this child related to you?" the woman asked.

Bedelia looked up at her with distaste. She hated when others called her a child.

"It's a traveling competition for school," Margaret gave, pulling the school's paperwork from her handbag. "She's a swimmer, I'm her coach, you get how it is. I have all the school releases I need. You can call the school, if you'd like."

But Margaret didn't _really_  have all the releases she needed; together, they'd forged Bedelia's mother's signature on the race's entrance forms, and though the school administration knew that Bedelia was entering in an out-of-state race, they didn't know that that race was far enough away to require a flight, and they didn't know that Margaret had booked the two of them rooms at a bed-and-breakfast rather than at the Hilton she would have promised. Luckily, the woman didn't ask for clarification and passed their identifications back with an understanding smile.

On the plane, Bedelia took her gifted Walkman from her carry-on, kept it with her as she sank into her seat, one by the window. Margaret sat alongside her, then glanced to the tape Bedelia clutched. Through the unspoken agreement, Bedelia peeled apart her headphones - the unclasped kind, ones that didn't go overhead - and offered one to Margaret. While Bedelia had been in England over the summer, her father had been playing this record, so on a jaunt to London, one she'd told her parents was a chance to meet a school friend but one which, in actuality, was done alone, she'd purchased the tape, had wanted to remember the way it had sounded off of the record player in his smokey study, the way he would open the aching window so that he could have a private pipe-smoke that no one else noticed. The pipe, that was Bedelia's informant; because no one would tell her that her father was dying, she had to rely on his pipe, something he'd sworn off of since before the oxygen, something he'd brought back out because there are only so many summer days left in which he can smoke it. He always insisted upon American tobacco, the history of which Bedelia didn't know but the background for which seemed dark, uncomfortable, rooted in poor American pastimes and the role of profit in the greater world. Though no one would outright label his illness, Bedelia knew its source was in the tobacco, that he'd largely been in control of his own demise, but somehow, she felt partially responsible, especially as she clicked the tape in and watched Margaret put on her end of the headphones. The land of her salvation was the origin of her father's demise, but wasn't that natural, an immutable law of this world? Was it wrong to believe that her happiness needed to come at a great cost to others?

And it wasn't as though the tape could simulate the sound of rain in the English countryside, specs falling on the dark wood of her father's book-lined study as he coughed through a smoke; there was no crackle of the vinyl, no muted stereo sound, no wafting tobacco kept secret through open windows and just-a-crack-open doorways while "Uncertain Smile" played. She could never go back, never replicate what once was, and as soon as he died, she would never be able to speak to him again. Wasn't that supposed to upset her? Wasn't she supposed to be taking time off from school to be with him in these last days of his? She didn't even know what the likelihood would be of seeing him at Christmas, yet she found that she felt so distant and detached from his eventual death. Was it wrong for her not to feel more?

Margaret relaxed back into the seat on the plane. _How long?_  Bedelia mouthed to her, to which Margaret held up one hand plus a pointer. Six hours in flight. Bedelia only had one tape. Looking out the window to the long runway, the waters and buildings of New York looming in the distance, she wondered how six hours in the air could keep them in the same country. That wasn't the way countries were supposed to be.

Reaching down to press pause, Margaret brushed Bedelia's hand.

"I know it's early to ask, but what do you want for dinner?" Margaret asked.

Bedelia shrugged, looked back down at where their hands met. Margaret had nice hands, womanly hands, the kind that made Bedelia's look thick like a baby's in comparison.

"No pre-race ritual, no nothing?" Margaret asked. 

"I don't really know what that is," Bedelia gave. 

"Then I'm forcing mine on you," Margaret said with an astute nod. 

"Which is?"

Margaret gave a sly smile, said, "Not telling."

"Come on!" 

"Absolutely not. It's a surprise."

"No cream, no dairy," Bedelia hypothesized, furrowing her brow as she tried to remember the nutrition lecture given before one swim practice last year. "No beef, I'm assuming."

"Well, yeah, not in this instance."

"Pasta is for runners."

"Pasta is for people who don't really know what they're doing."

"Steamed chicken."

"Well."

"Was I close?"

"You'll have to wait and see."

"You know I don't like waiting."

"It's good for you," Margaret said, smile wide. "Best to learn patience while you're young."

And before Bedelia could speak again, a flight attendant was asking them to buckle their seatbelts, power down electronics, everything Bedelia had done on enough transatlantic flights already; with takeoff imminent, their conversation quieted, and by the time they started to speed on the runway, Margaret was leaning over toward Bedelia's window, looking intently outside.

"I love this part," Margaret whispered, the secrecy between them special in how it wasn't special; she wanted Bedelia to know this small thing right as the wheels lifted up off of the ground but didn't want anyone else to know even as they all shared the same experience. In the unspoken silence between them, the altitude climbing in which all waited breathlessly for an announcement of proper height, they shared something intangible, something a tape couldn't even begin to replicate. For a moment, Bedelia experienced her world from the eyes of two people instead of just one, finding a newfound interest in how everything grew so much smaller in such quick succession, in how the lift made them feel so weightless.

"Mine too," Bedelia whispered back a little too late for different reasons.

* * *

The benefit of booking at a rustic bed-and-breakfast right by the water was that Bedelia and Margaret could see the setup of the race a day beforehand, watching as volunteers set up signs and canoed through the route. The cost, of course, was that bed-and-breakfasts, unlike the Hiltons in which the swim team stayed during traveling meets, had a greater margin of error.

"I'm so sorry," the near-elderly woman - she had grey hair, but it was long and tied back into a braid, and her skin showed that she'd had a lovely time landscaping the property all summer - said as Margaret tried to check in. "I only booked you for one room."

"Can we add another?" Margaret asked. The little lot outside of the place had been full, but _full_  meant that two station wagons and the owner's truck were parked alongside Margaret's rental. On the sign outside, they had claimed vacancy. 

"I'm sorry," the woman said, stumbling over her words. "With the race in town, we just fill up so fast."

Margaret tapped her fingernails on the woman's check-in desk, seemed equal parts impatient and understanding. Back when Cassie had been throwing away her races at every meet, Margaret had had the same look, something that said she would get to the bottom of whatever Cassie's struggle was but also that one more shitty race would make her scream. She'd never looked at Bedelia that way.

"Do you have a cot we can rent?" Margaret asked. "Maybe a couch that pulls out?"

Bedelia didn't know what _a couch that pulls out_  meant. The woman shook her head but offered, "The bed is king-sized."

So after their dinner in the main town - a dish of chicken over whole wheat pasta, something Margaret had ordered off of the menu for each of them - they left their bags on separate sides of the bed, their day-clothes still on, the subject of sleeping unspoken and uncomfortable between them. In the student handbook, the sports segment clearly stated that any traveling meets required coaches to sleep in separate rooms from students, though coaches should also have a method of monitoring the whereabouts of students within whatever establishment they slept; coaches were absolutely never to sleep in a room with students, not even if a bed was available, not even if it could save money. If the administration knew that she and Margaret were going to share a bed, Margaret would surely be fired. _But there were no other rooms,_  Bedelia could plead, bringing up all of that Mary-and-Jesus stuff, _because the race was in town. We did try for a cot, or a pull-out couch, whatever that is. This wasn't supposed to happen this way._

But she had to hide a slight smile as she leaned down, reached into her backpack for pajamas, for there was something so enticing about sharing a bed with Margaret. In her dorm room, Bedelia would wake at times in the night, and because of the breathy radiator, the aging windows, the emergency lights that cast brightness into her bedroom, she would have to calm her ancestral body, swear that nothing was actually threatening her and that her survival instincts needed to fucking stop; tonight, she would look over and see Margaret there and know she was alright immediately. Already, she could feel it: the pre-race fear, the sleeplessness, the sudden waking, the relaxation response like French wine sipped too quickly. To be seen, to be known, she had watched enough movies to know that other people were our pain, and there was no one other than Margaret with whom she felt safe. Even after bad races, bad grades, bad talk about other girls on the team, Margaret came back, asked her again what time their run together would be, sat with her in the dining hall and didn't even judge when she went up for seconds. The other girls would've mocked her, called her a pig, said where on her body that spare bowl would go and possibly point it out as an anatomical example, a more polite way of depicting _her hand on my ass_. Margaret never judged.

"Bathroom's going to be ridiculous," Margaret gave, pulling her own pajamas from her bag. "Face opposite walls?"

It wasn't as though they hadn't each seen the other nearly naked. Once, Bedelia had borrowed Margaret's two-piece for a swim before her flight to England, and on a rainy, wicked running day, Margaret had pulled her top off, abandoned it on the side of the road, sped up while Bedelia stared, dumbfounded at the sight of the long, floral tattoo from Margaret's ribs to her hip. The modesty was merely a social custom.

They jointly brushed their teeth; Margaret made small talk with tall, cut men who were racing tomorrow; people were surprised to learn that Bedelia was the racer among the two of them, that someone her age was opting for such a long distance. _Isn't she too young?_  someone would ask, and while they weren't looking at her, Bedelia would smile to herself, no teeth shown, pride in how she could call herself elite. Yes, she was too young, but with a forged signature, that didn't matter. In the morning, newspaper photographers would ask for her portrait as she stood alongside Margaret, for Bedelia was the youngest racer there, as well as, of course, the winning racer for her age group. In a Jimmy Choo box she kept in storage decades later, she still had the newspaper clipping, Margaret holding a towel over Bedelia's shoulders while they both smiled.

As they both climbed into bed, Margaret kept a bedsheet of space between them, her legs above and Bedelia's below. Bedelia turned off the lamp at her bedside, cast the room in a darkness that was just deep enough to make the room seem far-out and unreal but not deep enough that Bedelia couldn't discern each of Margaret's eyelashes.

"If you can't sleep, tell me," Margaret gave, turning onto her side and facing Bedelia. "I have pills with me."

"Okay," Bedelia said, facing back.

"Did you see that one guy, maybe Scott?" Margaret asked.

Yeah, _Scott,_  the hunk from southern California who had a sunburn on just one pectoral, a sunburn that he, of course, took off his shirt to flaunt. _How odd!_  he had said as he pulled a tiny bottle of aloe gel from his shave kit, waiting his turn in the bathroom line while he chatted with Margaret. He taught something like biochemistry at some university. Last year, he had had the third-best time in his age group, and this year, he wanted to win.

"Yeah, hard to miss," Bedelia said with a little laugh. 

He had been attractive, but men like him had something that Bedelia found infinitely unsettling in men: high levels of personal pride. Had he not been able to tell Margaret that he wanted to win, Bedelia doubted that he would've cared about winning at all. For men like that, achievement was for the sake of image, never for real accomplishment, and if swimming suddenly started to make his skin sag, his cheekbones go hollow, he would stop immediately. He couldn't feel pleasure unless someone else was watching. Bedelia couldn't understand people with motives like that.

"He gave me his phone number," Margaret said with a smile and eyeroll. "As if."

"He's cute," Bedelia offered.

"Yeah, but he thinks the sun shines out of his ass," Margaret gave. 

"All boys think that."

Laughing, Margaret said, "You're certainly not wrong."

"All those crew boys..." Bedelia shook her head against the pillow. "They think they're cool for no reason. None of them are interesting at all."

"Spoken like a true student of a women's school."

"Do they ever get better?"

Margaret grimaced, gave, "Not really."

"So what makes them worth it?"

"I don't know!" Margaret laughed. "They're handsome, and they can open heavy doors for you."

" _I_  can open heavy doors."

"They can open jars, then."

"You just have to tap the lid with a spoon first."

"They'll tell you that they love you."

"You already tell me that."

"I take it you have no interest in a boyfriend, then."

"I'd like one if it could be useful."

"It?" Margaret giggled. " _It!_  Like the monster in Stephen King!"

" _He,_ " Bedelia corrected.

" _It,_ " Margaret repeated, shaking her head and laughing. 

"Why don't _you_ have one, then?" Bedelia asked.

Again, Margaret grimaced, then said, "I did, not too long ago. Wasn't the right person for me."

"Did you like him?"

"Yes, very much," Margaret gave. 

"Why did it end?"

Margaret furrowed her brow, asked, "Do you ever feel like some people just won't ever get you? Like they'll always be a step behind but will never realize it?"

"Like they could try so hard and never have that effort make a difference," Bedelia added.

"Yeah, exactly," Margaret said. "He was like that."

"Were you sad when it ended?"

"Yes," Margaret said, "very sad."

Margaret checked her watch, saw the hour. At five-thirty, the whole bed-and-breakfast would wake to prepare for the race; they really needed to go to sleep if they wanted to be well-rested.

"No more chatter," Margaret gave lightheartedly. "Wake me if you need anything."

She turned onto her other side, faced away from Bedelia, and Bedelia did the same. This bed was much more comfortable than the one in Bedelia's dorm room. Closing her eyes, she took a deep breath, let it out slowly, tried not to think of the race tomorrow, tried not to think of weird Scott or the feeling of plants beneath the lake's surface touching her legs. 

"Margaret?" she asked.

Margaret hummed a response and turned toward Bedelia. Bedelia didn't face her.

"Do you think that I understand you?" Bedelia asked.

In the long pause, Bedelia could feel Margaret breathing, could smell her vanilla deodorant and laundry detergent in bed. Though the whole inn felt musty, Margaret made all of that seem to slip away.

"Yeah, you do," Margaret gave, then turned to face away from Bedelia again.


	13. Selfish Little Bitch

Bedelia deadbolted her front door for no good reason. At this point, she wasn’t sure what she had left to fear. Her lipstick had faded, her skirt growing uncomfortable, her accessory of a handbag concealing the evidence. Where would she put it, in the river? To wash up next spring, the syringe having turned to seaglass? Eroding on the shores of a British isle, where two little girls sharing an ice cream cone would find it, where their mother would say _no, that’s dirty,_  only in French that the younger girl didn’t understand. 

She didn’t know how to explain death to her sister. To her, the concept was simple: we’re all just meat in the end, and the sum of our parts can, most likely, be explained by genetic coding, electrolytic impulses, dehydration and hydrolysis and all of the reactions in between. Stella, of course, would ask the one question Bedelia couldn’t answer, the _why_  of it all. Why are we made to die? Why is our birth so meaningless in the wake of all else? Why would anyone - if they could even be considered a _one_  - do something as horrible as create all of us? Bedelia didn’t know, and arguably, she didn’t _want_  to know. What she wanted instead was to take off her shoes, pull away her clothes, and climb into bed naked, the fresh sheets curling around her, blackout curtains letting her sleep until she felt new again. Then, she would go to an early afternoon Pilates class, cancel her remaining appointments for a period of time, and call a mortician. Maman hadn’t left instructions for burial in her will, and though Bedelia figured cremation was the best option, she’d heard in the past that such practices went against Maman’s religion, whatever that truly was. The casket would be expensive but not too expensive. In her mind, Bedelia had already left ashes on the beaches of a French sea, where little girls would run through them and never realize that they weren’t sand.

Her feet ached as she pulled her high heels off, the pads feeling like bruises as they touched down to the hardwood. She carried the shoes by the heels as she walked into the still-lit kitchen, where Stella had left behind a pizza box and Bedelia’s since-opened wallet. _Cunt,_  she thought, taking the wallet and closing the box over one final slice, still faintly warm, just plain cheese. Bedelia didn’t like cheese pizza. With Greg, she used to eat it every Wednesday night, when it was half-priced at the Greek place near where he worked; by the time she got home from her day of residency, her two-and-a-half designated slices would be all that was left, along with a beer of his choosing. Even the smell now made her wince.

In Europe, she’d had good ones, good pizzas. In Amsterdam, she’d once ordered one with prosciutto, goat cheese, arugula, and mushrooms because she didn’t have enough euros on hand for anything more expensive and because she’d been stuck on a layover, her credit card company knowing she was heading to Milan but not that she was stopping along the way. She could still picture the place, right alongside the canals, springtime breezes picking up her hair, jet lag deep in her bones. Now, she could put herself back in that place, but this time, she would be wearing her current clothes, her hair less frizzed but styled the same way, someone sitting across from her. When they finally made it to Milan, he would ask for a cheese plate, strawberries, and champagne to be sent to their hotel room. Like Greg, he would do everything textbook-right, but unlike Greg, he would keep her guessing, a truth between them being that she was simultaneously the cornerstone and the gatekeeper of his life, that they were equals even though she held more power. If she asked to go to Greece the next day, he would pay for their plane tickets. She was out of control while still being in control. It was a fantasy, she knew, and though she knew better than to indulge in fantasy, she allowed herself another moment with this one, a second of purely optimistic contemplation. A man with strong arms, a man whose suitcases all matched, a man whose aftershave was pleasantly spiced and stuck just a little bit to her skin after she kissed him. A man who would bring her breakfast in bed and watch her eat every last bite. A man who gave her his full attention.

The cheese scent was making her nauseous. Turning toward her bedroom’s staircase, she walked forward, intending to go to bed, but stopped short as her foot felt dampness in the carpet. Life felt slower then, as she lifted her foot, looked down, didn’t know what to expect. Red, but not life-giving red, not all of it. She’d been meaning to replace the carpet anyway, though she’d expected to have only one catastrophe left upon it as some interior designer dragged it away, to be sold again or to be thrown into a landfill, to either end or extend its life beyond her home. Crumbled upon the carpet, bits of glass lay, all reddish and shattered, the mouth of a bottle left haphazardly above the stain. She could follow the little smears and toe-prints of blood. She hated that her sister was predictable.

So, one bottle. Stella had been drinking before, hadn’t she? Back when they’d been twelve and fourteen in London, Stella had tried a sip of Daddy’s wine and had said it tasted bad. Based on Bedelia’s own weight, she figured she could predict her sister’s, so all that was left was the timeline, the succession of events: if it all had happened quickly, then they would need a hospital, most definitely, but if it all hadn’t, then Bedelia could go to bed.

It wasn’t gross. After a certain point, Bedelia had learned better than to be attached, for some people just died, or just hurt themselves, or just couldn’t be reached. In psychiatry, she was told to look at the disorder, not the person behind it, but such a task was impossible, for biological and psychosocial models weren’t discrete; under the assumption that the placebo effect existed, few things were as biological as they were portrayed, and studies were published every day about the evils of psychiatric medication, about how _mindfulness_  was the new fad diet of the psychological world. She wouldn’t discount the validity of other treatments, but she knew that a significant portion of her patients relied on her for medication and little else, most even having a primary psychologist with whom they typically had sessions. In practicing psychiatry, she’d expected to experience the more graphic parts of human existence, the parts of the mind that were uncharted and impossible to define, the aspects of the mind-body relationship that offered insight into who we all were as people, but it was rare that she received a case that made her think beyond _fifty milligrams of Zoloft_  or _encourage exercise._  While many of her colleagues seemed to fear the chronically mentally ill, she yearned for a case with complications, with history, with all of the typical treatments proven moot. Though there was satisfaction in helping others, there was no satisfaction in prescribing antidepressants simply because she could. The greatest satisfaction, she found, came from hearing how a schizophrenic patient whose diagnosis had come after a time of despair was proud of a well-deserved promotion at work, or how a bipolar patient called her to say he was voluntarily checking into a hospital because, for the first time, he was able to push back against the manic thoughts and find safety. There was something profound about watching her research, her inquiries to colleagues, her atypical attempts, and her treatment help a person self-actualize. She hadn’t found another high like it.

But some people couldn’t be helped. She knew that Stella didn’t want help. As she descended the stairs, followed the bloody toe-prints, she knew that Stella’s actions had been meant for Stella alone. She wasn’t sure that Stella could think beyond herself. That was how it had always been, hadn’t it? They each fended for themselves, and even when their combined resources ensured safety, they would stray from each other. In introductory biology in high school, Bedelia had been asked a question of resources, of why people would hoard when there theoretically was enough available for everyone, and the answer had been that a sense of scarcity and unpredictability led to an every-man-for-himself mentality. She couldn’t think through her degrees as she pressed open Stella’s bedroom’s door, finding the place empty. As they’d grown up, Bedelia had watched the dwindling of certain elements, the way that they boarded fewer and fewer horses, the way her mother and father eventually stopped speaking to each other altogether. From when Bedelia was eight onward, she’d watched their life grow dichotomous, her father looking at her with strained, uncomfortable eyes while her mother mocked her conjugations, her accent, her hair, her intelligence. She’d never understood how Stella had grown so close with their father, how the eventual shift had brought him away from the rest of the family and toward his youngest daughter, but the closeness had been obvious. In the evenings, he would read to Stella in his study, the two of them sitting together in his big armchair; on certain nights, he would read to her from big, thick books, all of his favorites, and add in little commentaries so that she would learn the words, but on other nights, he would bring in a big-paged picture book and ask Stella to read it to him. Even when she mispronounced something, he would ask her to go on, and sometimes, he would pause, ask her questions about the text as though it were profound. 

And some people just couldn’t be helped. She was losing her train of thought. She was exhausted, and she didn’t want to clean up another of her sister’s messes. _She only thinks about herself,_  Bedelia thought as she found Maman’s door ajar. _She thinks she can do whatever she pleases. She thinks she can fuck a coworker and just get away with it. She’s naive and always has been. She doesn’t realize that her actions have an impact, yet her work is founded on how she can help others. She can’t possibly do good if all she can ever think about is herself._  Though the newspaper article flaunting Stella’s picture seemed to imply that Stella had strayed from her childish ways, the content had also proven that Stella hadn’t. Wasn’t it some kind of social rule, to not fuck a coworker? Why would she do something like that? Bedelia knew better than to find addiction in other people, to get a fix from some guy she never wanted to see again. For those cases, vibrators existed, or showerheads, or tub faucets. Humanity was moving toward independence, and she could see that in how quality of life was determined by how much people didn’t have to do and how few people one could interact with on a day-to-day basis. Stella shouldn’t have needed some now-dead man to meet the simplest of needs.

But part of Bedelia, a part she tried to quell immediately, thought of the man in the newspaper and pulled up a fantasy of someone else, an anonymous hotel room paired with a known face, the room torn apart just enough that they would leave a fifty-dollar tip for the housekeeping staff. Though she would act as if she wanted him gone, as if she were doing nothing more than fulfilling a need, he would message her something later, an _I can’t stop thinking about you_  that she’d secretly hoped to receive. Maybe it would be at a psychiatric conference, and they would leave the talks and festivities to go back to her room, always hers, and then order breakfast together in the morning. Then again, they would never stay in a hotel hosting one of those conferences; they would stay in the nearest Ritz, commuting back and forth in that posh way she so liked. She would never want to marry him, but he would ask her a few times, his arm draped possessively over her bare stomach, her arm placed on top of his. The sex would be what drew her in, but the romance would be what kept them together for five or ten years, inevitably drawn back to one another, accidental run-ins in, say, Rome or Prague leading to caught-up nights spent telling stories of life as pillow talk. If she asked him to, he would follow her wherever she led. He would attend her mother’s funeral, even if he had never met her mother.

Bedelia opened Maman’s bedroom door to find the room dreadfully askew, the blood vials cracked and spilling, the journals crushed on the floor, Stella collapsed beside the notebooks. Stella looked pale, paler than just English. Close to Stella’s aimless hands was reddish-looking vomit, not bloody but still distressing in its shade. Bedelia knelt onto the mussed rug and stared at her sister for a moment, surveying the nearly-unmoving scene, trying to determine a course of action. Stella’s breathing was easy, normal, deep enough, so the closed eyes may have been misleading; after the transatlantic flight, and at such a late hour, it wasn’t a shock to find Stella asleep, regardless of the location. Reaching out, Bedelia touched her sister’s cheek, found it warm, human, lifelike, rough and spotty in a patch. Bedelia couldn’t see evidence of seizures or other irregularities. For now, she didn’t think Stella needed a hospital. 

In college, she and Greg had taught a safety class on alcohol consumption, for the medical students could receive pay for such things, and the two of them needed bar money. Though the curriculum - mostly facts about not pre-drinking and lists of emergency telephone numbers - didn’t require them to demonstrate aid techniques, Greg would prompt the fireman’s carry at times, then ask her if she would like to help him show the class how such a thing worked. Because of her shoulder, she would never be able to do such a thing comfortably, so he would have her act as dead weight, then lift her over his shoulders in demonstration. She’d liked the feeling of his taut muscles beneath her. 

So. She set down her shoes and took to Stella in the way Greg had taken to her. If their mother were still alive, Bedelia would simply have put Stella in this room’s bed, but now, she wouldn’t let herself do such a thing. As Bedelia carried her sister, she teetered on her feet, her shoulder taunting her with every step. Though she tried to lift from her legs, her upper body was unstable; she just couldn’t do things like this anymore. In Pilates, she was rarely forced into such positions, but now, with weight on her shoulder, she felt pinching pains, the aftermath of surgeries and physical therapies and Margaret, Margaret telling her that she wasn’t going to be recruited for college, Margaret claiming that one more bad race would mean she was cut from the team altogether. In retrospect, the threats - she could call them that now - had been false and rooted in unreality - Bedelia had never been lowest on the roster even with the bad races, and even Cassie, of all people, had been recruited for college sports - but nonetheless, Bedelia could still hear them mentally, could feel involuntary twinges that she knew weren’t from Stella’s weight. Leaning against the wall in between the two bedrooms, Bedelia tried to cast off some weight, to give herself a moment of rest. _Plenty of athletes peak in high school,_  her coach in college had reassured her as she’d taken the bench for yet another competition, but the reality was that her retirement, if she could even call it that, had been preventable. At her angriest, she could call it the result of violence. She'd intended to make records. When she'd signed with her university, she'd intended to be the greatest. She'd never meant to be the team's dead weight.

In the bedroom, she gingerly brought Stella down onto the unmade bed, smoothed out her sister's pajamas, pulled the comforter over Stella's body. Bedelia settled herself near the foot of the bed, her eyes on the rise and fall of Stella's chest. This vulnerability, this complete surrender, meant that Bedelia could find answers if she so desired. After all, Stella's cell phone - the one that didn't have the number that the police of Northern Ireland had taken over - was only inches away, and with a fingerprint to its sensor, Bedelia could see much of Stella's life, everything from pictures to old messages to the last three places she drove. In Stella's suitcase, Bedelia could find her sister's makeup, passport, clothes. Though Bedelia shamed herself for it, she wanted to look through her sister's things, to piece together the last two decades so that she could somehow understand why they were together now, Stella deeply drunk and Bedelia motherless. Despite the years between them, Bedelia couldn't understand how things had changed so drastically. When she'd last seen Stella in-person, her sister had never seemed the type to work for the police, let alone one to go unmarried and childless into middle age. Of course, Stella would have needed the help of others in order to be married and have children, but nonetheless, Bedelia felt challenged to imagine her sister alone in a house in London, going to bed alone, commuting to work alone. She'd never known that kind of Stella. 

Growing up, they'd never been close, especially not after Daddy's death, but Bedelia could remember being in her dormitory alone after losing her virginity and thinking of the phone down the hall, of using a long-distance card from the all-hours newspaper stand on the street below to call her sister. She felt as though she ought to tell someone, no one other than Stella seeming as though they would care. As she lay in the extra-long twin bed, the sheets smelling like the body spray she would make him stop wearing, she imagined dialing the long number for the rotary-dial in Stella's boarding school dorm, saying _hello, good morning, I did something last night_  or another equally inelegant sentence. Weren't things like this supposed to be inelegant? They were supposed to be snagged, sweaters with pulls in the sleeves, something ragged on purpose. On the other end of the line, Stella would have been an impish kind of excited, teenage askance making Bedelia feel like some kind of _cool girl_  for once. In the end, Bedelia never called. The next morning, Greg asked if she wanted to get diner food, and she said yes because that's what you're supposed to do after losing virginity to each other, or so she figured. He hadn't stayed over because she'd thought her roommate would be returning at some hour of the night. She'd wished he could have stayed.

The first time Bedelia heard of her sister having sex was when Stella was being ostracized for a lack of professionalism and the disintegration of a marriage in wake of a one-night stand. It felt wrong, as if Stella couldn't possibly possess such power or agency. Didn't Bedelia need to hear about some measly shag first, a he-comes-in-two-minutes ordeal spoken late at night while they shared a bedroom in a vacation house? The last time she'd physically been in Stella's presence, Bedelia hadn't even known if Stella had so much as kissed a boy before. A girl, she figured, but a boy? She didn't know. Of course, Stella had been twenty, so it was logical to say that she most likely had, but Bedelia still couldn't fathom such a thing. Wouldn't Stella have told her? But then, what reason would Stella have had to ever tell her?

Reaching out, Bedelia took her sister's small, weightless hand in her own, wanted something to hold on to. This hadn't been the way it was all supposed to be. They were supposed to have been girls together. They were meant to have been innocent. They were supposed to have loved each other. _But I do love her,_  the small, vulnerable, fearful voice in the back of Bedelia's mind said, and she wanted to annihilate the statement, to wrap her fingers around it and crush it in the palm of her hand. She wanted to look at Stella and feel nothing, but now, as she looked at her sister, she felt as if a heavy weight were on her chest, keeping her from breathing. Now, they were the last of a bloodline, two cast-off girls representing mismatched heritage that they longed to forget. Though she could try to explain it all to therapists, to friends, to men and women and bartenders and taxicab drivers, Bedelia knew that no one would ever be able to understand her like Stella could. Despite how such a thought usually instilled anger in her, it now made her feel anxious, uncomfortable, abandoned. Bedelia hated Stella for the duty she felt toward her sister but wanted that duty all the same. From her sister's birth onward, Bedelia had known she was meant to be Stella's protector, that it would be a long time before someone else could handle such a duty, but Bedelia had failed her sister. After Daddy's death, she'd given up altogether. She hated Stella for the burden of loving her. She hated loving people at all. She just wanted to move through life alone, to do what she wanted to do alone, to come out on the other side with only her own goals - never those of another - completed. She didn't want to feel like this, especially not over a person.

But she loved Stella. The feeling felt inevitable, unavoidable. Bedelia didn't know how to cope with this kind of feeling, this staggering anxiety, other than to deny it. Retracting her hand, she faced away from her sister. Soon enough, Stella would be on a plane again, returning to the other side of the ocean. In only a few days, their familial ties simply wouldn't exist anymore, not in this tangible, physical way. Bedelia would return to her patients, Stella to her policework, and they likely wouldn't speak again. The ending would be crisp and finite, the closure obvious. All Bedelia needed to do was let it happen.

From her sleep, Stella stirred, so Bedelia closed her eyes, took a deep breath. _Your mother is dead,_  she reminded herself. In only a few days, she would be free from it all, as would Stella. 

"She's gone," Bedelia said after her sister seemed alert enough, cognizant of the current moment.

A second passed, then another, before Stella was sick on the floor.


	14. Interlude: Your Apartment I

In the daze of it all, in the discomfort and loss, she could only remember being asked her blood type, then trying to say that she didn't know what it was. She'd been right to call someone, wrong not to call an ambulance. When she woke this time, she wore a hospital gown, a bad sign; if this were something reasonable, something normal, she would've felt damp and bloody, stains dripping from her shirt to the bedsheets beneath her, but instead, she was warm and dry, not wearing underwear, the tie at the back of her neck too loose. Around where someone had put in an I.V., she had a bruise. A bag of O-negative hung overhead, looking bright and human in the otherwise stark room. In a pulled-up chair, one that looked more apt for a dining room table than a hospital, Jo sat awake, wearing jeans and a leather jacket, a pair of high heels cast off at her feet. 

"That's unsanitary," Stella said. Though she respected the people who cleaned hospitals, she distrusted the real power of chemical cleansing agents; if blood had been on this floor, she had a sinking feeling it would never quite come out. Jo's bare feet ought not to touch a hospital floor.

" _Shit!_ "

Jo startled in her seat; Stella noticed the book on her lap, something captivating, something distracting. 

"Fuck," Jo said, composing herself. She was wearing lipstick, not _work lipstick_  but the kind someone wore to go out. Stella couldn't remember what day it was. "I'm on-edge right now. Sorry."

Jo forced out a sigh, closed the book, let it fall on top of her cast-off handbag. 

"You should've called an ambulance," Jo said, this time in an authoritative tone, a tone that knew better. 

Stella tried, "I'm sorry."

"It's alright." Jo reached for Stella's hand, left her own right alongside; if Stella wanted to be held, she would have to initiate such a thing herself. "Now, that is."

Stella took Jo's hand, gently held the woman's soft fingers, and with that gesture, Stella found herself exhaling a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding.

They were silent for what felt like a long time. Stella looked down at their hands, at how Jo would move her thumb back and forth across Stella's knuckles, the gesture both unnerving and comforting. Now, there was a solid entity, a real person, alongside her, and this person had seen firsthand what Stella had done. Though Stella knew she ought to feel remorse, discomfort, vulnerability, fear, she found herself feeling indifferent instead. Somehow, she'd wanted Jo to know this. _A secret,_  Stella surmised, _passed from one person to another._  Jo could keep a secret.

"Why did you do it?" Jo asked, her tone low.

There was an answer, but there wasn't _truly_  an answer.

"Because I was scared," Stella said, the admission feeling oddly natural. Usually, such a thing would make her feel small, but now, it was too logical, too correct. Somehow, despite the circumstances, she was telling the truth.

"There are other things you can do when you're scared."

"This works."

"No, it doesn't," Jo brushed off. "Obviously."

"Why are you dressed like that?"

Jo smiled to herself with resignation, with knowing. _Yes, go ahead and change the subject. That's alright._

"I was going out."

"Did you go out?"

"No, because you called me."

"Where were you going?"

"I hadn't figured that out yet."

"Why not?" 

"Because I hadn't," Jo brushed off. 

Coming closer, Jo took her hand back and set her arm alongside Stella's, reaching up to lean toward Stella's shoulder. She rested there for a moment, her weight falling against the bed.

"Tired?" Stella asked, meeting Jo's gaze.

"Oh, _very,_ " Jo said with a nod.

"Come in." Stella tried to move over, tried not to jostle her leg. Though she hadn't looked down at it, hadn't been able to see the remains of her work, she knew that there were stitches in, that thick dressings were covering the stitches. Even moving a little bit felt uncomfortable. "There's space."

"No. I don't want to hurt you."

"Please?"

There was plenty of space alongside Stella; Jo could come up without altering the drip from the bloodbag, without harming Stella's wounds. Looking at the space, Jo concentrated for a moment, tried to make a decision.

" _Fine,_ " she gave in, then ever-so-gently climbed into the bed, kept away from Stella at first.

It was odd, the feeling of this woman's warmth next to Stella's, but Stella liked the way they were there together, both of them sharing one small space in one strange room. The last time she'd been in bed with someone else, she'd been worried of what he might do in the night, scared that she would wake up once more to him inside of her, not knowing how he'd managed to do so while she was still sleeping, not being able to push him away. She'd forgotten that being in bed with someone else could feel good.

"May I tell you about the moment when we first met?" Jo asked, looking toward Stella in the bed.

Gently, Stella nodded. Though she could remember the sparse moments spent against Jo's side in a police car, she couldn't remember getting into the car, let alone being pressed up against Jo's side, Jo cradling her softly. For the most part, Stella hadn't questioned the sequence of events, had only let the feeling of safety stay while her memory faded.

"I'd just gotten to the scene, the house," Jo gave, "when two medical technicians...they looked uncomfortable, and I've seen that before. I knew what to expect, I think. Luckily, one of them recognized me and knew that I had a background in psychology. They told me that they'd tried to look at your neck and that you'd been very against it."

With prompting, Stella could remember parts of it, the sensation of people reaching out to her, the horror of flashlights directed down at her while she lay in snow. She swallowed hard, not wishing to recall those moments.

"You'd tried to run off, but you didn't make it far before you were on the ground again, and I was supposed to wait for backup, but when I saw you, something just...it felt like something primal had taken over," Jo said. "You were horrified in every sense of the word. I knew that the injuries wouldn't matter to you until you felt safe, so I went against all better judgement and lay down beside you. You were hyperventilating, not even blinking, and when you looked over at me, it was like I could see in your eyes that you were determined to survive, that you felt you _needed_  that kind of determination. Then, you curled in toward me - there was snow all over you, even in your hair, and you must've been freezing - and reached for me.

"I should've carried you to the medical technicians, but I felt as if bringing you back to them was somehow morally wrong, like they would only hurt you more. It was naive, I know, but I saw the running car, knew it was warm, and ducked you in there instead. You were shivering so much, and we didn't have many police on the scene, and backup was far off. All I could do was hold you and cover you in a blanket the technicians had tried to put on you. It was such a relief when you finally spoke. It was an even greater relief when you let the technicians stop your bleeding. When we got to the hospital, you had to be sedated, but you made it that far on willpower alone."

Jo shifted awkwardly, uncomfortably. Looking over, Stella tried and failed to read Jo's expression, one cast-off and facing away from her. 

"It was so strange," Jo gave. "I didn't even know you, but I felt _proud_  of you for that. I couldn't get that out of my head for weeks."

In the silence that followed, Stella could feel the thrum of her heartbeat, the warmth of the woman next to her. For once, she wasn't anxious. If she were to fall asleep, she knew she would wake up feeling safe. Even when inevitable panic came, she could look to Jo and know she was safe. Here, there wouldn't be an evening spent feeling hypervigilant after a nightmare about the man; there wouldn't be panic about paying with his money; there wouldn't be a sense that, just around the corner, she would find him, and he would kill her this time, surely kill her. Finally, she was safe.

"You don't have anyone, do you?" Jo asked, though her tone implied that this wasn't a question.

"No," Stella gave. 

"You won't be able to stop doing this alone," Jo said. "No one can do that alone."

 _You're assuming that I want to stop,_  Stella thought but wouldn't let herself say.

Jo let out a long breath, relaxed deeper into the bed. 

"I have a couch," Jo gave, "and I'm close to the tube. It's not much, but it's something."

"I can't-"

"You wouldn't have to pay rent, but I would appreciate something every once in a while, when you can manage," Jo powered on, as if she wasn't able to stop speaking after having started. "I know someone who would be willing to treat you, someone who could get you in right away."

For a moment, Jo laughed to herself, shook her head, looked to Stella, said, "If you're a good cook, I'll pay you to stay, I swear."

"I can't do that."

"Can't cook?"

"Can't take your..."

Stella couldn't figure out which word to use.

"Your offer," Stella managed.

"Why not?"

"Because you're..."

"A cop?"

"Because it's not your job."

"It's not as if my job really means something."

"You help people."

"Yeah, that's what you'd assume."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I let you go," Jo gave. "They released you into a cab, and that was it. And now you're here. The police won't help you get back on your feet. Believe me, they've abandoned people over less."

"So you feel that you owe me something."

"No, no," Jo gave, flustered. "It's just that..."

She swallowed, tried to find words.

"You don't deserve to keep living in the shadows of what once happened," Jo managed. "And if I can look at you and know that I could do something to make your life better, it feels wrong of me not to help."

Jo sighed, growing uncomfortable.

"I just want you to be safe," she finished, resigning. 

Stella thought of her apartment, of the tiny studio that only had enough contents to fit in three cardboard boxes, provided that she tossed the mattress. The fridge was empty. They could clean the whole place out in under an hour. 

"Okay," she said, nodding once.

From there, Jo looked up at her, relief in her eyes.

"Okay," Jo agreed.


	15. Interlude: Your Apartment II

At the first swim practice in January, Bedelia felt a twinge in her shoulder. _Nothing,_  she labeled it as, for she'd been overworking to the point that bodily protest made sense. 

"My shoulder's off," she told Margaret while pulling herself out of the pool. "I'm going to take it easy."

 _Take it easy._  That was an American thing to say. In their lanes, the other varsity girls were working legs or arms, opting for kickboards or a shoestring tied around their ankles. Because one girl had gone to Barbados for winter break, her shaven legs were clad in pantyhose, the most prominent swim team rule broken in favor of feminine ideals. Bedelia had shaven for Oregon but hadn't since.

"You sure?" Margaret asked. She was in sweatpants, a tee shirt, a baseball cap even though they were indoors. "Or is this just a little post-break reluctance?" 

Margaret winked knowingly. Usually, girls took all of winter break off from sports, but Bedelia hadn't. In fact, she'd called their driver every morning so that she could go to the pool before anyone else in the house woke, and back in England, her locker at the club still held bottles of shampoo, conditioner, even some Creme de La Mer. The nice thing about clubs was that they had everything one needed: food, exercise, showers, towels. If she wanted to stay there all day, she could, going from the hot tub to the pool to the sauna and back again; she was thankful to never have to go home.

It had hit Stella the hardest, she knew. Maman had barely blinked, not even on the night, The Night, it was a night that Bedelia could only see in a cinematic way. _Here,_  a voiceover would say, _is your father. He is choking, and your sister, your stupid little sister, tries to save him. The ambulance is too late - by approximately twenty-five years, if tobacco takes the full blame - and there isn't any light in his eyes. Your sister stays there all night. You can tell that she doesn't know what's going on. That's the tricky thing about teenage girls, how they know all but still can't seem to internalize that knowledge. Take Sadie Frank, the freshmen, for instance. She's fourteen, and last year, her brother killed himself. Now, she talks about it normally, as though nothing happened, but the second death comes up in an assembly, she leaves in near-tears. There's a sense of misplaced pity. Do we hold her and tell her we're sorry, or do we not? She knows that everyone dies eventually. She knows her brother isn't coming back. However, she still has a girl's heart, a hopeful thing not quelled even in the most drastic of circumstances, an undying and obnoxious sense that maybe, just maybe, she can blame herself, and if she blames herself enough, things will be right. Girls are supposed to repent, aren't they? And Stella wants to repent. Stella even goes to church the week after he dies, lights a candle and everything. Stella watches him die but thinks he's still out there somewhere. You know better, so instead, you just don't feel anything. When they mention death at assembly, you control your breathing and don't react. Sadie ducks out in the familiar way. You, in your uncomfortable assembly chair, wearing your uncomfortable winter tights, sitting next to girls who won't let you in on their whispered gossip, stay. In cases of family emergency, the school is to be informed, but your family is far away, and your mother doesn't speak English, or so that'll be your excuse. No one here needs to know. No one here ever will._

"I think it's overworked," Bedelia gave. "Just legs?"

Margaret nodded in confirmation. "You know what you're doing?"

"I know what I'm doing."

"Atta girl," Margaret gave, tapping Bedelia's bare leg twice. "Tell me if it starts to hurt."

It didn't start to hurt, and Bedelia didn't go back to Margaret, not after practice had ended, not after all of the girls had showered off the chlorine, not after everyone had gone back to their dormitories and readied themselves for dinner. After dinner, Bedelia studied in her dorm room - still empty, still single, still somewhere that let her hear the muffled sounds of other girls chatting and having fun while she looked over her Latin yet again, not knowing what to make of a translation. Could she ask Margaret? She wanted to ask Margaret but didn't want to be asked anything in return. _How was your break, B?_  would turn the room volatile, and what Bedelia wanted most was an easy transition back to being in the United States. So far, she still felt jet-lagged, she was premenstrual, and she...she knew how to fill in the rest of that sentence. Regardless of her definition, she wasn't in the proper condition to be asked how her break was. Next week, she would be alright, but this week, she wanted to keep her head down and get through. She couldn't be detached just yet, but given enough time, enough driving on the right side of the road, enough space from little sisters, she would find herself far from her English home, seeing the little frame of her dormitory as being the encapsulation of her world, of biding her time between chats with Margaret and sips of tea in the Latin classroom. It wasn't escapism when it was just school. It wasn't avoidance if she had no reason now to return.

At swim practice the next day, Bedelia's shoulder was fine, and as she swam her warm-ups, she found that her mind went delightfully, blissfully blank, soft and empty and serene; even with Cassie in the next lane kicking water toward Bedelia, making Bedelia catch some in her mouth a few times, Bedelia still found herself easing back into the routine, the practices, the normalcy of her life. At boarding school, everything was on a succinct schedule, school bells starting at six-thirty in the morning because some students didn't have alarm clocks, those bells persisting until nine in the evening, the time when underclassmen were to leave the library after their two required study hours. Everything had a specific time and place, and anything that didn't solidly fit within the schedule was left out. Sisters abroad were overlooked altogether. Bedelia had to pencil her times in Margaret's classroom into her planner. There was little happenstance. In such an environment, Bedelia could let herself go numb, could move through her weeks and months barely remembering the differences between the days, could maintain the straight-A average she'd had last semester, could finish the year with a reputable record that would mean she had chances at all of the good colleges. She could get through this. 

As Bedelia pulled herself from the pool, she found Margaret kneeling down in front of her, waiting ecstatically. 

Panting, Bedelia spat, "What?"

"Don't look so annoyed," Margaret gave, playfully tapping Bedelia's thigh. "I've got news."

"You're pregnant." 

" _Funny,_ " Margaret gave. "I've missed you."

Bedelia sighed, asked, "What is it?"

"Someone's scouting you."

"Scouting." Aubergine, capsicum, the British-to-American translations sometimes didn't make sense. So far as Bedelia knew, _scouting_  in the United States was something boys in cargo shorts did, having their mothers sew on badges for things like selling cookies or something along those lines. If someone were to _scout_  her, she wasn't sure it would be complimentary.

" _Scouting,_ " Margaret emphasized. "Looking at you. Getting a feel for your talent."

"A feel for my talent."

Looking around, seeing that all of the other girls on the team were otherwise occupied, Margaret leaned in, whispered, "A coach wants to recruit you for a college team."

Bedelia's eyes grew wide. _Oh._

"Which college?" she asked.

Margaret bit her lip in a smile.

"Massachusetts," Margaret gave smugly. 

"And?"

"Made of bricks..."

"Is Massachusetts on the west coast?"

"Bill Gates..."

"Building gates?"

"Do I honestly have to spell this out?" Margaret asked. "It's like...Oxford, but over here. _Ha!_  That kind of sound."

_Ha? Ha. Ha..._

At the revelation, Bedelia swallowed uncomfortably. 

_Oh, shit._

"That's not possible," Bedelia gave.

"It's very possible," Margaret threw back. "You're a breakout, kid. You shot up the ranks in record timing, you train hard as hell, and you've got killer talent. They're into you."

"And if they want me to swim for them, I automatically get in to the university?"

"Yeah, more or less."

"But it's just them."

" _Just them?_ " Margaret scoffed. "If they want you, the other ones are going to want you too. It's just a matter of time."

"When will they..."

Bedelia trailed off, shook her head, looked to Margaret. _I don't know how any of this works._

"We'll know when," Margaret said, nodding. "I'll keep track on your behalf, represent you when need be. If you have your mother sign, I might be able to have greater liability in your case."

"That would be great."

"Well." Margaret tapped Bedelia's shoulder, the one that wasn't twinging today. "Do your best. You don't know who's going to be watching."

And over the next few days, there _were_  people watching, new people, a few men in winter clothes and some people who would talk back and forth with Margaret, who not-so-discreetly pointed at certain girls as they swam. Of course, not all of these people would be scouting Bedelia, but Bedelia could feel their eyes tracking her, knew that they were following her strokes. _She's good,_  she could almost hear them saying to Margaret, _very good._  She could almost hear Margaret saying back _yeah, she's my best girl. She's the very best I've got._

On Saturday morning, Bedelia had her first meet of the season, and she could see the telltale spectators, those dressed just a little too formally for a high school swim meet in the middle of Connecticut; they watched her and other girls, nodded at the good performances, did everything they could to _scout_. As she pulled on her cap, smoothed the braids Margaret had given her beneath it, she looked over to them, almost challenging them. _Yes,_  she wanted to say, _I am good enough for your school. I am the best competitor here. Give me a career, and I'll give you records. Give me a degree, and I'll give you prizes. Coach me, and you'll see the best talent of your life._  Even if everything else fell apart, even if her little sister was distraught, even if she continued to be the friendless, threatening girl in her graduating class, she could still swim. Nothing else mattered so long as she could swim.

Diving position, the starting signal, she knew these things with such ease now that as she freestyled, she barely had to think. Though Margaret's pre-meet pep talk was still in her head - _go out with an aggressive pace, give it all you've got_  - she could tune out the rest of the world. At this point, she didn't have to glance at the other girls, gauge where she was, determine if she really needed to speed up; all she needed to do was push, push harder, keep pushing, and then, she would be able to touch the wall and look back, watching each of the other girls come in, smiling the whole time. She didn't have the personality of a loser, let alone a second-place finisher, and somewhere out there, someone from that brick school starting with a certain letter was watching, their interest piqued, their eyes stuck on her. She would be their perfect athlete, their headline-maker, just like she was for her high school now. They would never be able to doubt her. They would choose her and not once regret that choice. They would give her a career, but she would give them excellence. Nothing could compete with excellence.

Hand to wall, she looked to the lanes next to her and found them entirely empty, no one just a hair off of her time; only when she faced the remainder of the pool, the set-up lanes and tiles marking where to flip-turn, did she noticed that the other girls were beyond arms-lengths back, at least fifteen seconds off. Suddenly, a hand clapped down on her shoulder, and when Bedelia looked up, panting and startled, she found Margaret there, face wide with a smile, eyes bright and ecstatic.

"That was insane!" Margaret said as Bedelia pulled herself out of the pool, still catching her breath.

As suddenly as Margaret's hand had come to Bedelia's shoulder, Margaret wrapped her arms around Bedelia, the embrace feeling almost natural, and after a moment of stunned discomfort, Bedelia managed to hug Margaret back, wet arms soaking Margaret's coaching jacket, Bedelia's cap pulling at Margaret's hair. In the background, Bedelia could hear the other girls reaching the wall, the telltale taps coming in a swift succession; though second place might not be obvious, first would plainly be. Though Bedelia didn't look back, didn't survey the spectators, she knew that they weren't looking anywhere but at her and Margaret, the two who knew that this swim would be a record-breaking one. There wasn't anywhere else worth looking.

The last time Bedelia checked, sometime in the early 2010s, she still held the record for that pool, one that was still used for high school swim meets today. Under their freestyle lists, her name still appeared, along with the year completed; though a few had come close in more recent years, no one had surpassed her time. In the local paper the next day, reporters showed a picture of the embrace, the headline shouting out that true talent had been found at a small all-girls academy, that the next big thing was an English girl whose name was remarkably un-English. Somewhere, with all of the other things she kept from those years, Bedelia still had that clipping, next to the picture of her and Margaret in Oregon, next to the other things she chose not to look at.

After the meet, she fell into a daze, not listening to Margaret's post-meet talk, staring blankly out of the van's windows on the drive back to school, feeling almost unaware of when they actually arrived. As she exited the van, she stared out at her campus, all strangely-colored buildings, old and regal; the snow, the leafless trees, it all seemed dull and unremarkable in the falling light. She looked down at her hands, wrapped each into a fist, took a deep breath. If she showered and put on warm clothes, maybe she would feel like she'd won. Had she looked at the recruiters, she would've felt like a winner, but she hadn't. In front of her, the other girls began to walk toward their respective dorm buildings, some talking about Saturday evening plans, some discussing brunch for tomorrow. Bedelia didn't have anyone to go to brunch with, always opted for the one in the dining hall, would oftentimes sit with Margaret every Sunday morning while they swapped pages of the Times. Over coffee, they would discuss the happenings, what was going on at Wall Street, how many life-altering changes were happening in a city that was so close but so far away as well. _I want to take you to New York,_  Margaret had said once, _but not to the airport, not like that. I want to show you everything._  When Bedelia had asked what _everything_  meant, Margaret had shaken her head and smiled. _Does it matter, B?_  she'd asked. _It's New York. Everything there is everything._

"Hey."

Pulling away from her thoughts, Bedelia looked up to see Margaret in front of her, the woman's eyes full of concern.

"You're off," Margaret said. "What's going on?"

 _I want another hug,_  Bedelia thought but scolded herself for thinking. 

"I'm fine," Bedelia gave. "Just tired."

"Yeah, right," Margaret said, unbelieving. "No one else is here. Tell me what's up."

 _My father's dead,_  Bedelia wanted to say, _but if anyone knows, that's it. People will treat me differently. They already treat me like I'm some freak. And I wanted to be that way, to be unapproachable and above, but I didn't want it to mean that I was alone in all things. I wanted it to mean that the wrong people never came near me, that the right ones instinctively knew me. But none of the wrong ones will know what to do about my father. They'll tell me they're sorry and try to be close to me. I just want them to act as if nothing's happened. I want life to go on as if nothing's happened. I didn't love him, and he's dead. There's nothing more to say about him._

"Seriously," Bedelia gave, brushing the conversation off. "I'm fine."

Margaret paused for a moment, then nodded to herself in resignation.

"If you need anything-"

"I'm _fine,_ " Bedelia emphasized, then began the walk toward her dormitory.

The hot shower was enough to make her warm, but as she brushed through her hair in her bedroom, as she put on warm pajamas, as she pressed a spare pillow against the aging, drafty window, as she tried to open a book or her homework in order to occupy herself, she couldn't feel her accomplishment, couldn't feel much of anything. Though she knew she should go to the dining hall for dinner, she didn't feel hungry, wanted to stay here instead. The sun set beyond her window, casting the campus in stark winter darkness; she didn't have something to do, a friend to see, a place to go. Down the hallway, she heard some girls talking about a dance at an all-boys academy. Even the weird girls would at least go out for pizza together, heading to the place down the street from their school. 

Three years in, Bedelia didn't have any friends. She didn't even have a roommate, and she doubted anyone would volunteer to be hers if she ended up needing one. None of the freshmen class knew her name at all, and because of how the other girls had always mocked it, Bedelia didn't want anyone else to know. At swim practice, Margaret usually just called her by her first initial, and that was enough. Swimming reported her as _du Maurier_  and nothing more. Despite it all, she didn't hate her name, in fact liked it for its individuality, its beauty, the way it rolled off her tongue so smoothly and delicately, but it was tainted nonetheless. She was an English girl with a French surname and an Irish first name, the French from her mother and the Irish from her father. Her mother hadn't named either of her children, and though Bedelia didn't want to ask about it, she knew that such an honor had been given up with ease, that Maman hadn't _wanted_  to give her children names. Of course, Daddy was all over an Irish name, passing on the heritage that he had seemingly so little attachment to, so her name was Bedelia, the almighty one, the strong. For Stella, he gave something vaguely incorrect - Stella, not the proper Estella - to mean star. _Stella, my star,_  he would say, and Bedelia would listen to them talking, so alike in their sensitivity, so unfortunately close that they seemed to share the same heart. He never called Bedelia strong. He never called Bedelia much of anything.

He should have given Stella the strong name. She needed it more than Bedelia did. At birth, Bedelia must have been more resilient, more guarded, for she couldn't remember a time when she felt as if she didn't have to defend herself. All along, she'd known the truth of the world, that no one would ever save her, that no one would even help her either; if she wanted something, it was hers to find herself, and no one else would help lighten that load. For Stella, that revelation never seemed to come, and instead, she relied on Daddy for everything, crying to him and laughing with him, being so much a part of him that, even when he couldn't breathe anymore, he tried to breathe for her. Bedelia had watched it, an onlooker and not a participant; she had heard the crash of the oxygen tank, Stella's scampering, a single scream that let the whole house know how the evening would end. For once, Bedelia had followed the disaster, not avoided it, and she had found them trying to revive each other, Daddy collapsed against the side of his mahogany desk, Stella kneeling beside him, hands on his chest, willing him to breathe. From the study's doorway, Bedelia had watched how he met Stella's eyes, held contact while she begged, pressured him into taking another breath. He'd been sick so long, and even before he'd been sick, he'd smoked so much that his lungs would surely be dead by now, stuck in certain places, the right one completely useless and the left so deteriorated that even the slight breaths he could take would never help; hypoxia was hypoxia, unpreventable in this case, unyielding in the face of a little girl with two small hands, two hands that used to hold her Daddy's, two hands that would reach for Bedelia, two hands that Bedelia would push away. 

But he'd taken another breath for her. One last breath, something just for Stella. He was trying to keep her alive, not himself. Had Bedelia been the one with her hands on his chest, he wouldn't have tried.

She wanted a friend. She wanted to call someone and talk. She wished she could go down the hallway like other girls did, knock on a peer's door, and go in to talk. On Saturday nights, some girls would push their beds together so that everyone could sit together in one room, all talking about boys and college and homework and what new music was coming out. Bedelia had seen those nights only in passing, when the door happened to be open as she walked down the hallway. If she were to knock, no one would answer. 

 _Margaret would answer,_  she thought but tried to quell. She couldn't see Margaret on a Saturday night. Would Margaret even be home? It wasn't as if Bedelia could call and ask. Nonetheless, she found herself reaching for her coat, pulling on her boots, taking her dormitory keys with her as she left the building, walking in the dark on the practiced route toward Margaret's apartment. At the dimly-lit door, Bedelia stood, knocked twice. She looked up at the door's little motion-activated light, all yellow glass and copper around a single bulb. In the summer, moths would tick it on at night, fluttering too close and then trying to connect with the light afterward. Tonight, there weren't any moths.

When Margaret opened the door, she looked forward with a confused glance, unsure of why someone would ring at such an hour. As she looked down at Bedelia, her gaze softened. 

"Hey, what's wrong?" Margaret asked, reaching out to touch Bedelia's shoulder.

Bedelia swallowed hard, looked up at Margaret, tried to be the strong girl no one had ever told her she was.

"My father is dead."

With that, she forced herself toward Margaret, wrapped her arms around her friend, held Margaret close like she'd wanted to all evening. Margaret smelled like soap and lavender, like the fields in France that Bedelia had run through with her sister. Back then, she'd been able to laugh with her sister, to be giddy whenever they escaped from the nanny's grasp, to cheat and lie their way through whatever they could until an ice cream cone was in their hands. Now, she had to watch her sister, to sit at the foot of Stella's bed and make sure that Stella was safe. If Daddy was dead, then no one would protect Stella. _It's my job to,_  she'd told herself as she watched her sister sleeping, _no one else is going to be able to protect her._  But Bedelia had returned to school, as had Stella, and now, Bedelia didn't know if her sister was safe. She wasn't sure she could bear to ask.

Gently, Margaret brought her arms around Bedelia, hugged her in close, let out a deep, remorseful breath. Until then, Bedelia hadn't realized that she was crying.

* * *

She woke to January rain outside, an uncomfortable trickle that left Margaret's apartment feeling achingly cold. That was how these Connecticut winters were, so humid that a bone-deep chill went with her wherever she went. On Margaret's couch, she lay beneath a spare comforter, one that she pulled up over her shoulders. Margaret's boots were out of the shoe-tray, so Bedelia assumed she had gone to brunch, to Bedelia's dorm, to somewhere that would let her explain one student's disappearance. If Bedelia was needed anywhere, Margaret would have woken her up, but she hadn't, so Bedelia burrowed deeper beneath the comforter, took a deep breath, let it out slowly. She didn't need to do anything. All she needed to do was stay here.

From the meet, she could feel her shoulder aching, just the one, but she ignored it for the moment, pulled the comforter up and over her chin, kept warm. She hadn't intended to stay all night, but once Margaret had let her into the place, once she'd pulled off Bedelia's coat and led her to the couch, it had grown clear that Bedelia couldn't leave, that she wouldn't be able to make the walk back, that she needed to be here. It was so simple, how all she'd had to do was show up. All she'd needed to do was let Margaret hold her on the couch while she cried. Without words, Margaret kept her close, hid Bedelia's face in her neck, rubbed Bedelia's back as if she were a baby. _It's okay,_  Margaret would whisper when she could, and after enough times, Bedelia had felt compelled to believe the statement, for things could be okay when someone held her like that, when someone gave her their full attention, when she didn't have to worry about how red her face was or how bloodshot her eyes were, when someone else wanted her to be everything she was without holding back. Even if she didn't have friends in her grade, she had Margaret, who was willing to see her through the night, to sit with her on the couch until she fell asleep, to run fingers through her hair in order to relax her. She didn't need anyone else because she had Margaret.

 _I love you, B._  She could hear it in her head now, how natural it had sounded, how necessary. _I love you, B. I love you, B. I love you, B._  She didn't need anything beyond her first initial in order to be loved. She _was_  loved. Even if her father was dead, even if her mother wouldn't care for her, even if her little sister was now a troubling and unsafe nuisance, Bedelia was loved. Nothing else seemed to matter.

She was hungry, and she wanted to find Margaret, so she forced herself out of the comforter, started looking around for her boots. Brunch would still be going on at the dining hall, so she pulled on her coat, slid into her boots. From a hook by the door, Bedelia borrowed an umbrella, then made her way out of the apartment, heading back toward the campus, umbrella up. She walked through the puddles with a lightness in her step, an almost fervor; she felt as if the shadow of her father's life upon hers had been lifted, even a dreary day becoming a blessing. Now, she was free of those feelings, of those people, of that life. Her father was dead, and she could move on. In the future, she would be swimming in Massachusetts, getting a fantastic degree, being a record-breaker with an illustrious career. Things would get better. When she finally reached the main building of her campus and took down her umbrella, she noticed that she was smiling. 

Outside of the dining hall, she hung her coat on one of many racks, then walked in. The tables in the hall were all round, seating about eight people each, and based on one's grade, one would sit in a certain area, some tables meant for seniors while others were meant for freshmen. Bedelia's class had the tables farthest from the faculty's table area, so typically, she opted to sit with Margaret instead, but as she looked around the dining hall, she couldn't see Margaret anywhere. _Strange,_  Bedelia thought but brushed off. She was hungry anyway, so she headed toward the breakfast buffet line, figured she would find Margaret after she ate.

As she tonged at eggs and bacon - not her favorite, but they'd do - she could feel an awkward tenseness in the girls behind her in line; they would nod in thanks when she passed them a serving utensil, as if there was some kind of honor in that. Uncomfortably, she moved out of the line early, forewent a drink in favor of finding a spot to sit. At the juniors' table, she obviously stuck out, but in most cases, no one would ask why she wasn't sitting with Margaret, why she was actually with her grade for once; all she had to do was eat, and then, she could do something else, something better, something that didn't involve these people. Staring down at her plate, she forced herself to marvel at the food, to focus solely on eating so that these people wouldn't alter her mood. She just needed to eat, and then, she could go find Margaret. Then, she wouldn't feel this unease anymore.

Alongside her, Cassie sat down, accidentally splashed orange juice from her glass onto the table.

"Sorry!" she said all-too-loudly. 

Bedelia forced herself to take a deep breath, the kind Margaret had taught her to do with Cassie.

"Morning jitters, am I right?" Cassie asked with a laugh that the other girls unfortunately reciprocated.

"Also," and this time, she leaned toward Bedelia, brought her tone down, made it more serious, "I'm really sorry about you father, Bedelia."

At first, Bedelia couldn't conceptualize the statement, for Cassie had pronounced her name as _Bedaylia,_  not _Bedelia._

"Thanks," she managed, trying to understand the weight of the statement, trying to think of why Cassie would know when only Margaret knew.

"If you ever need someone to talk to, I'm here!" Cassie gave jovially.

For a moment, Bedelia couldn't form words, but eventually, while all of the other girls stared on in abject horror, Bedelia asked, "Cassie, who told you about that?"

But in the end, Bedelia hadn't needed to ask.


	16. Bad Moon Rising

Inside the funeral home, Stella wore sunglasses as if she were a lone blind mouse, the other two lost somewhere between her sister's strange house and the outskirts of Baltimore. She held a container of coconut water in one hand and a banana in the other while the mortician - Tony, if Bedelia was remembering correctly - detailed the different aspects of each presented casket, all lined up and labeled as if they were cars for sale, each color-schemed in a respectful but drab manner. The wildest color was navy, and even then, the casket was solid, lined with fabric and padded at the bottom, completely neutral even with its comparatively brash shade. Bedelia longed for something red.

"Would you prefer gasket or non-gasket?" Tony asked as Stella wavered on her feet, wearing flats and slacks and a shirt stained at the collar. 

At three in the afternoon, Bedelia had knocked to tell her sister that they needed to find a casket today, that the funeral could be held in two days if they made the proper arrangements before seven this evening. Reluctantly, Stella had peeled herself from the bedroom, looking pale and exhausted and greasy-haired as she slowly climbed the stairs toward Bedelia's mussed-up living room. Though Bedelia had thrown the pizza box away, had gotten rid of the wine bottles and broken glass, the stains on the carpet and stairs remained, a walk of shame done up by her sister for her sister. Despite how tempted Bedelia had been to offer her sister a sponge and some spot cleaner, she hadn't, for no one for that drunk without a reason. Bedelia didn't want to know the reason.

"We would prefer without," Bedelia gave.

Sealing a casket only made the body decompose faster, and underground, it didn't much matter whether or not gases came in. Though articles made the reasoning misleading, the gasket itself was meant to protect the casket, not the body, and that protection came at the cost of rotting the body sooner. It was strange how in death even a wooden box was worth more than the person who would spend the remainder of their biological state inside of it.

Stella took a deep, audible breath, a wheezing type. Bedelia hoped she would last through the planning, at least.

"We have veneered wood models in both half-couch and full-couch," Tony said, reaching a hand out to flaunt said models as he moved them through the yellow-lit room, Bedelia's heels wavering on the carpet. _The Vanna White of funeral homes,_  she thought as he brought them alongside something wooden and half-open, the white bed-like lining inside looking unfortunately comfortable. She could almost picture Stella climbing up and slipping herself inside, closing the top for a moment of peace, but Stella stood still, breathing shallowly, looking awkward and unlike herself in sunglasses and tied-back hair. It was a privilege, Bedelia knew, to be able to look like that in a public place.

They decided on a model that was full-couch and made from dark auburn wood, something that fit the budget, something that neither woman particularly liked or disliked. As they sat planning the funeral, Tony asked about invitations, about printing memorial cards, and only then did Stella make a sound, a little humorless laugh from behind her specs, a _why the fuck would we need those?_

"And what about a priest?" Tony asked, hands folded on the desk in his office, open-mindedness in his visage.

Stella looked to Bedelia. Bedelia looked to Stella. 

"Catholic," Stella guessed, trying to make her voice sound confident.

"Yes," Bedelia agreed. 

Their mother hadn't been to church likely since the Christmas before Daddy's death, and that was only because Daddy had wanted to go, a want that had meant it would be a family affair. Daddy had been Catholic but unremarkably so; it felt fitting that, only a few weeks before his death, he returned for one last time, asked to make peace with God on one of the holiest days of the year. For that Christmas, Stella received books and Irish jewelry made from gold or sterling silver, all from Daddy. Bedelia received skirts and cashmere sweaters for school. Bedelia assumed Stella still had the jewelry. She herself didn't still have the sweaters.

"We can arrange for that," Tony said, marking down in their file the proper denomination. Bedelia doubted that Stella believed in God. "We offer a flower service, if you would like to order arrangements."

"No," Bedelia said quickly, too quickly, quickly enough that Stella looked at her with furrowed, aching brows. Concern. Bedelia didn't like concern. By way of explanation, she gave, "It's a useless expense."

"Alright," Tony said, marking that down. 

It would only be a burial, no churches involved, no guests invited beyond the nurses who Bedelia knew wouldn't come. One life, two guests. Or, rather, Bedelia was assuming two guests, for Stella hadn't overtly said that she wouldn't be attending. Would it be wrong to ask? Was it wrong to assume? In the end, Bedelia knew that Stella's choice to attend was, of course, Stella's choice to make, but the idea of Bedelia being the only person to attend their mother's funeral made Bedelia wince, not for her mother's memory but for herself. She didn't want to experience that funeral alone.

"And finally," Tony gave, "how will we be paying today?" 

Bedelia reached into her handbag for her checkbook, the proper one associated with the proper account. Stella cracked open the bottle of coconut water, her purse left in the car parked outside. They had yet to talk about inheritances, a future topic that weighed uncomfortably on Bedelia, but still, their mother had only passed less than a day beforehand. Hesitating, Bedelia clutched at her checkbook, tried to remember if her mother had been given last rites. 

"We can do a down payment with a payment plan, or we can do the total today," Tony offered.

"We'll pay the total," Bedelia said, opening her checkbook, reaching out for a proffered pen.

While Bedelia wrote the grand total, signed her name, ripped the check, Stella sipped her drink, uncaring. Though Stella didn't realize that there had been money from Maman's estate set aside for a funeral, she nonetheless didn't offer payment, responsibility, even a sense of wanting to plan. Bedelia had asked her sister along out of respect, but Stella didn't seem to reflect that respect back.

As they left the funeral home, Stella leaned in, asked, "That's a convenience store, right?"

7-Eleven, across the street. Outside, two cars were parked, a sedan and a pickup. The ice box looked stained with something in a shade between mud, blood, and vomit.

"Yes," Bedelia gave.

"For more than just cigarettes, though," Stella tried for clarification. "For toothbrushes and whatnot as well."

"Yes, of course," Bedelia gave, not knowing why a store would sell only cigarettes.

At the car, the driver opened a door for Bedelia; before he could move around to Stella's side, Stella asked, "Do you mind if I stop in? I left a few things behind."

"We have _things_  at home." Bedelia slid into the car, blocking Stella from her respective handbag.

"It'll be two minutes, I swear."

Resigning, knowing she wouldn't win this back-and-forth, Bedelia waved her off, but Stella didn't move, not without money, not with the banana and coconut water still clutched before her. 

"My bag," Stella promoted awkwardly, Bedelia in her way.

The driver didn't know where to go, so he stood alongside the car, hands clasped in front of him. He looked over-dressed for the neighborhood but under-dressed for someone driving Bedelia, who wore Jimmy Choos and a wrap dress that proved she would never wear something _casual_  even in a casual context.

Sighing, Bedelia pulled a twenty from her wallet, pressed it over to Stella.

"Be quick," she insisted, so Stella walked off, looking less wobbly than before but clearly still holding those last aches of a bad hangover. 

So the Stella Gibsons of the world forgot toothbrushes in the haste of packing. Bedelia never left for a trip without a tube of Marvis ginger-mint and a proper soft-bristled brush. Even if she were to forget, which she wouldn't, she would inevitably be heading to a place that sold such things, Paris or Milan, perhaps Montreal if she wished to be burdened by an accent; regardless of location, she never needed to go into a 7-Eleven and find a toothbrush almost a full day after arriving at her destination. Even if all social burdens were removed, there was still the element of the bad feeling in her mouth, the uncomfortable taste. Overnight, bacteria in the mouth flourished in the same way they did in a corpse, and Bedelia wouldn't stand for a corpse's breath even if she was the only one noticing it.

In the distant windows of the gas station's store, Bedelia could see her sister, could follow Stella's little tied-back bun and dark sunglasses, could watch as Stella puzzled through one rack, picked a few things up, headed out of view to the checkout. So she'd left behind more than one thing. Maybe it had been the frenzy of emotion, the sudden nature of their mother's demise; maybe it had been that Stella was unaccustomed to packing for short stays, used to trips like Belfast in which it was more practical to simply purchase shampoo and other amenities at the destination. Not that Bedelia would ever do that, given how her hair was too sensitive to change for even the implication of a new brand, but Stella seemed like she might.

Stella returned with a plastic bag too opaque to give away its contents. Bedelia scolded herself for looking. The driver opened Stella's door for her, closed it behind her once she was inside. In one exhaustion-shaky hand, Stella offered the change, a ten and one and some coins.

"I'll pay you back," Stella gave in favor of thanks.

The driver shifted out of park in silence, the sisters left on opposite sides of the backseat, the Mercedes a familiar brand to each of them but for vastly different reasons. In her handbag, Stella crumpled the plastic bag, then took a sip of coconut water, the banana abandoned on the seat between them. Bedelia crossed her legs and looked out the window, saw only dull parts of Baltimore, knew that everything here would look the same for the whole drive home. When she'd purchased her house, she'd loved how different it was, how individual, uniquely American in that it was indulgent and designed; though she admired the way the buildings in Paris looked, she liked that her home was unique and unrecognizable, from no culture whatsoever. However, the surroundings were distinctly American, sprawl beyond sprawl, like the outskirts of New Haven after she'd tried to charm the recruitment team there. In the end, it had been for the best - she wouldn't have been able to tolerate four more years of Connecticut anyway - but she could still feel the sting of not being accepted, the incapacitating blow of her one little injury. Had she hurt her leg, they wouldn't have minded, but because she'd hurt her shoulder, the team had looked at her as if she were some battered child, someone to pity, someone to say _no_  to in a way that felt shameful but unavoidable. 

But she would have despised four more years in Connecticut. She wouldn't have met Greg. It was better this way. She knew it was better this way.

"Would I be able to borrow your computer tonight?" Stella asked, interrupting Bedelia's thoughts. "To book a return flight."

_For when?_  Bedelia wanted to ask but didn't say.

"Yes," she gave. 

"I'm thinking Saturday," Stella said. "They don't want to keep giving me family leave."

But wasn't this her first family leave? In what other circumstances would Stella have needed family leave?

"Yes," Bedelia gave, unquestioning.

Outside, Baltimore looked like Baltimore. Bedelia needed to get out of here.

"I'm sorry about your rug," Stella said, eyes on her lap. "I'll pay to replace it."

Bedelia doubted her sister had the money, not on a cop's salary, but she smiled in acceptance nonetheless.

"The carpet's certainly seen better days."

"Will you be taking patients this week?"

"No."

"Is there..."

Stella trailed off, swallowed, measured her words.

"Do you need anything from me?" she asked, facing Bedelia. "I know that I lack most of the resources, the documents-"

"If I need anything, I will ask," Bedelia said with a finite, emotionless nod.

Stella paused awkwardly, unsure of how to interpret such a statement.

"Alright," Stella said, then turned back to face her window. 

As Bedelia did the same, Baltimore stared back, looking like Baltimore, looking like America. _Maybe I should travel,_  she thought, marking out her calendar in her mind. At this time of year, France would be lovely, warm but touristy, expensive but only a bit; she could purchase more Caudalie, bring back a suitcase full of Dior, visit one of the equestrian estates. She could picture bringing back a L'Occitane box as a gift for someone, a new tube of French aftershave that she knew he used in it, some cream because she'd noticed how his hands grew dry in the winter, but a box like that would end up in the back of her closet, growing dust before the end of the year. She couldn't see patients for a week, then strut off to Europe. Though she was someone who fed her appetites without inhibition, she was still a professional, and she respected her patients enough to keep from leaving them hanging. Nonetheless, staying here felt suffocating, impossible even if her sister weren't here, and she needed something different, something interesting, a change in cuisine, culture, and power. She needed her mother's bedroom to be empty. She needed the funeral to be over. She wanted her sister to fly home, never to be seen again. She wanted to ask someone over for dinner, claiming she owed him a meal. In her mind, she'd already planned what she would cook, each course mapped out while the dessert remained a mystery. 

_You can't have a crush on a patient,_  she told herself, but he wasn't a typical patient; he was a patient and colleague, the boundaries already blurred by circumstances unmade by them. She liked him but wasn't sure she was allowed to _like_  someone like him, someone she treated. She admired her patients, but she wasn't supposed to _like_  them. 

With him, it seemed strangely inevitable, the liking. It came up in how he mentioned the opera, his translation of Dante, a talk he was giving about the psyche of Mussolini; the things he did, the aspects of his personality reflected in his actions, showed her that, in a different and more accessible lifetime, they could have been friends. She pictured them sharing a box at the opera, dressing well and seeing each other once a month at a performance. Before the show, they would speak about professional matters, new research, the conferences that they would inevitably both attend; he would tell her that she looked beautiful, and she would ask him for a better compliment than that. _You know me well enough,_  she would say, _so what more can you offer?_  And he would smirk and play along, for she was right.

_You can't have a crush on a patient,_  she insisted to herself, but then again, it wasn't a crush, was it? No, it was just admiration, a thought of _what if._  A _what if_  wasn't unprofessional. If they saw each other at a conference, it wouldn't be unprofessional to make small talk. In fact, it might be unprofessional _not_  to make small talk. Conferences tended to be a cesspool of strange identities, for shrinks had shrinks, and shrinks wanted to have good shrinks, and good shrinks went to conferences. In the end, her situation was entirely normal. If she saw him at a conference-

_Oh._

After Greg, after her move to Baltimore, she'd been recruited to a team researching schizophrenia at a university near the hospital in which she completed her residency. Because she'd lost time to changes in specialty and to recovery periods from surgeries, she knew it would be best to add as much to her résumé as she could, particularly in research-based fields. At that point, she'd assumed she would teach someday, so a university credential of any kind would be of use to her. The research, to her surprise, had been stimulating and interesting; she'd never thought that she would spend Saturday nights looking over EEG output, monitoring the changes in pure awe, but she would still be in the university's buildings well past closing, the nighttime janitors knowing her by name. Because she was one of few to stay in the Baltimore area over time - the university's turnover rate was high - she began leading the project, something done in conjunction with a university from which she'd been denied undergraduate acceptance, and over time, she became the one who knew the data best overall, the person called upon when no one else could answer a question. Every few years, she was asked to present the findings, and though she usually deferred the responsibility to a less-qualified individual, someone who likely needed the exposure, she'd taken the position this year, even in her mother's late-stage illness. Or, rather...she wouldn't think about that any further. 

In two weeks, she was scheduled to present her findings in Vienna, where translators would be provided and where her registration listed that she spoke English, French, and Italian. Her German was good enough to get her around Vienna but not good enough for her to feel comfortable listing it at a professional event. She'd made her slides four months ago and had booked a flight around the same time. For accommodations, she typically waited and left her location more up to fate; it was only when the Ritz-Carlton ran out of rooms that she truly found the best hotels, and she liked the gamble, the bargaining. She liked weighing the pros and cons of two different city views, one of the sea or one of mountains, each an indulgence in and of itself. She liked that sense of hedonistic control.

So she would be in Vienna, and he might be there too. It wouldn't be unprofessional to ask. In the other seat, Stella leaned against the window and closed her eyes. Bedelia watched Baltimore pass and wondered if she and another might accidentally visit the Kunst Museum at the same time.

* * *

At seven, Bedelia was ready for dinner; Stella was nowhere to be seen. Though Bedelia knew that the day had been strenuous for Stella, she couldn't let go of how voluntary the pain had been, or how the destruction had been purely self-made. If Stella was in agony, then she would be in agony. There was no reason for Bedelia to pity a hangover brought on by an inevitable moment that Stella could have denied. Had Bedelia been in Stella's situation, she would have wanted one last look at their mother, but she certainly wouldn't have downed bottles afterward. Two, three glasses maybe, but not bottles.

Her sister couldn't cope. All along, her sister had never been able to cope. With just one scratch, she would go crying to Daddy, who would plaster the wound in a way anyone could replicate, but of course, Stella wouldn't let anyone else do it for her. Though Bedelia had originally thought the cowardice came from a want for attention, she'd soon learned that Stella actually _needed_  the aid, that she was almost entirely helpless on her own. Maybe that was why she was a cop now, all self-sufficient and living alone and working to make sure that inferior law enforcement groups had the proper staff. For once, Stella was competent. Though Bedelia knew better than to judge Stella in adulthood using childish memories, something felt false about how her sister was still her sister, just without the plasters. It didn't make logical sense.

At Stella's bedroom door, Bedelia knocked once. Set for dinner, Bedelia wore heels and a dress, something different from this morning, something that didn't smell of lilies and embalming fluid and funeral homes. Her curls had been fine, but she'd scrunched them again anyway, added a bit of spray for posterity. Though she didn't particularly _want_  to have dinner with Stella, she knew that proper hostessing required feeding the guest, even when the guest was hungover, even when the guest was more than willing to order delivery instead. What exactly was to Stella's tastes nowadays? Bedelia assumed it wasn't delivered pizza every day, but nonetheless, she didn't know what Stella would prefer, if she could manage at a finer kind of restaurant. _Of course she can,_  Bedelia tried to tell herself, remembering Stella's fine handbag and tailored pants, knowing that her sister was refined even if her idea of refinement was below Bedelia's own. Still, Bedelia could picture the scene, Stella ordering truffle macaroni and cheese like some kind of child, Stella asking for a lobster bib to pair with surf-and-turf that Bedelia knew would never be messy. Bedelia didn't even want to think about what their dinner conversation could be.

Stella didn't answer, so Bedelia knocked again, growing impatient. Of course, she _could_  leave her sister behind. She wanted to, didn't she? Knocking once again, this time more fervently, she didn't hear a response, so she brought her palm to the handle, opened the door to find the room dark and askew, the comforter on the bed stained, the scent of vomit from the night before staying uncomfortably in the air. The blackout shades were most all of the way down, letting in just a sliver of light; Bedelia could see cast-about clothes, Stella's sunglasses sitting on the bedside table, the banana from this afternoon left alongside them, but the rest was cast in darkness.

When they'd returned to the house, Stella had immediately gone to the bedroom and hadn't left since, so she needed to be somewhere in here. Bedelia turned on a light, tried to find a path, but this time, Stella hadn't left one behind, no trail of blood to follow, no broken glass upon a ruined rug where someone had once died. Why had she even kept the rug? She wondered what Stella would think of the story, of how someone had died right where she'd broken a wine bottle. _She'd be horrified,_  Bedelia thought, then found herself making a fist as she realized that she didn't feel the same way.

Maybe Stella had passed through the bathroom to Maman's room, surveying the damage. Bedelia hadn't cleaned any of it up, wanted to do the whole room all at once, wanted the mess to go out with her mother's things. Of course, she would keep the journals, the French antiques, the photographs in shoeboxes and the jewelry, but she wouldn't keep the clothing or sheets, the recent things. Though some would be donated, most of it would be thrown away, cast out, given up. She didn't want her mother's things in her house anymore, not unless they could be re-purposed, not unless they could be put into a box and called keepsakes, not unless they were a chronicle of things Bedelia couldn't bear to think about. Stella did seem to be the type who would sit among a dead woman's things and think, imagining each piece of clothing on their mother, looking at the tiny television set up on the dresser, wondering what soaps her mother enjoyed most. Somewhere, hidden deep in the closet, was their mother's makeup bag, still filled with Yves St. Laurent lipsticks in an unflattering red shade. Bedelia could picture each one in a wastebasket, gold-plated and let go. She wondered what it would feel like to watch the garbage bag being taken away, never to be seen again.

When she opened the door, Bedelia heard a yelp; she looked down, and there was Stella, the room dark around her, her pants left in a pile in the bathroom's corner. Her legs were out long enough for the door to hit her ankle, her back against the shower's tub, and she sat on a bathmat, bottles of rubbing alcohol and other cleansers at her side. She'd set a dark towel alongside her buttocks. For a moment, Bedelia was still, unblinking, staring down as she took in the scene: Stella looking up at her, the scent of antiseptics, blood. Even in the dark, even with the towel catching what fell, Bedelia knew it was blood. In Stella's hand, Bedelia could see the inhuman source, something so outdated but simultaneously stereotypical; on the sink, the plastic bag from 7-Eleven lay empty. 

Stella moved her fingers so slightly, trying to form a delicate grasp around the single blade in her hand, and in that instant, the world grew volatile again, the stillness disappearing. 

" _Don't,_ " Bedelia stressed, anger in her voice, as she stepped forward, clapped her hand around Stella's, pulled the bloody blade from her sister's hand.

Bedelia dropped the blade into the sink, let it fall loudly against the porcelain. Could she flush them? Alongside the bag was the pack of them that Stella had purchased, five more ready for use. In hospitals, those would be taken out with other sharps, but Bedelia didn't know how to take these things from her home and have them surely destroyed. Why would convenience stores even sell these anymore? No one used them for their designed purpose anymore, did they? Bedelia shoved the remaining blades into the sink, not knowing what else to do, and flicked on the switch, made sure to see her sister in full light.

"I'm a _psychiatrist,_  for God's sake," Bedelia spat, rolling up her sleeves as Stella shielded her eyes with her palm. 

Forcing off her shoes, Bedelia knelt onto the tiled floor, sized up the injuries. There were six cuts, all fresh, all bleeding; each had a seep to it, no arteries nicked, no reason for emergent concern. Based on how none were particularly deep, how they all were done systematically, carefully, Bedelia didn't need to see the since-faded scars on Stella's legs to know that this wasn't the first time. 

Bedelia needed gloves. Somewhere in the cabinets of this bathroom, Maman's nurses kept gauze. For now, there was no need for stitches, so Bedelia only needed to stop the bleeding, dress the wound, and monitor Stella from now on. _This isn't my fucking job,_  she thought as she stood, opened the medicine cabinet, found sterile gloves and dressings.  _I'm not supposed to keep saving you. If you want this life, then it's yours, all yours. I don't want any part of it. I want you gone._  She snapped on the gloves, folded the gauze up. _You can't even go a day without trying to destroy something. That was how it always was, wasn't it? I would have to clean up whatever mess you made. If you were upset, you went to Daddy, and anything you did before then was my fault. You broke a vase, went running to Daddy, and let Maman blame that on me. You play the victim even when you're the perpetrator, perhaps especially then. I thought by now that you'd have managed a different pattern, but I shouldn't have been so optimistic. You may be a policewoman, but if you look inward, you'll find that you're nothing but a little girl. And no matter how much you hurt yourself, no one is going to save you this time._

Looking down at her sister, Bedelia watched as Stella covered her eyes, perhaps still hungover. Some people simply couldn't be helped. Why had she felt so soft last night, so open? She hated her sister. She wanted her sister to be on the next flight back to London, would even book the ticket herself. She wanted her house to feel empty, the only clothes in the closets being her own, the place a haven of her own making. After this, she couldn't stand to see Stella again, not with all of the dramatic aggravation, not with all of the volatile behavior. Her sister couldn't be saved, and now, Bedelia knew better than to try saving her. It wasn't as if anyone could.

Stella quivered where she sat; Bedelia noticed how the hand in front of her face shook ever-so-slightly, how Stella cringed at being seen like this at all. Despite the dark towel, blood was already on the white bathmat. As Bedelia knelt again, brought the gauze to the wound, Stella flinched in both pain and something more; the angle was awkward, so Bedelia sat down in order to apply pressure, felt the horribly human give of Stella's leg beneath her palm. When she looked up from the wound, their faces alarmingly close, Bedelia couldn't quite see Stella's face, but around her trembling lips, Stella had the streaks of tears, a silent giveaway to what she was trying to repress. When Bedelia had first found her, Stella hadn't been crying.

Reaching up, Bedelia grabbed for Stella's wrist, forced her sister's hand down onto the wound. 

"Hold pressure," Bedelia gave.

Stella nodded quickly, not speaking. Looking over the antiseptics Stella had purchased, Bedelia found all she could have needed; unfortunately, Stella knew what she was doing. Finding iodine, antibiotic cream, Bedelia lined them up as best she could, tried to remember if there was medical tape in the house. 

Glancing down at Stella's hand, Bedelia found it limp at the gauze, so she pushed her own hand over Stella's, insisted, " _Pressure._ "

Beneath her hand, Bedelia felt Stella's hand push in, grow momentarily stronger. Stella tilted her head away from Bedelia, a halfway form of hiding, but she still held the pressure as she took a deep breath, as her hand kept shaking anxiously.

_Good,_  Bedelia thought, holding Stella's hand, making sure the pressure was constant. _That's good._


	17. Interlude: The Park, Covered in Snow

For breakfast, Jo made eggs over easy and bacon. 

"I swear you'll like this woman," Jo said, setting two plates down on her kitchen's island table. "She's great. A spunk, like you. Good sense of humor, but quiet too, in a caring way."

Nodding, Stella stared down at her plate, took to the fork and knife as if they were objects she'd never seen before. She couldn't remember the last time she'd eaten breakfast.

"How did you meet?" Stella asked as Jo ate casually, easily. 

"Undergraduate. No, graduate," Jo corrected. "We were never close, but I see her around sometimes."

With only three cardboard boxes full of things to her name, Stella had moved in with ease, her things left in the entryway's closet of Jo's flat. Though the living room was small, only a little bookshelf, a television, and a picture window surrounding the couch, Stella had taken to the place with relief, glad to be out of her wretched studio, glad enough that she didn't mind sleeping on couch-cushions done up with spare sheets. 

Gently, Stella took to the meal, trying not to push herself too greatly, trying to make the action easier. Cut, bite, chew. It felt stupidly challenging, to eat as if eating were nothing.

"How much have you told her?" Stella asked in between bites.

Jo dipped her toast in yolk. She had long, bony fingers, the strong kind, the kind that would only look strange with rings. On her wrist, she had five freckles arranged in an ornate, angular shape. 

"Not much," Jo gave, mouth full. "Just that you were in the hospital, that he's dead now."

Stella looked down, nodded toward her food. Bite, chew, swallow. It really wasn't _that_  hard.

"I can come in with you if you need me," Jo offered, but Stella shook her head. With a little cheerful smile, Jo gave, "Yeah, thought so."

They walked together to the woman's office, the place only a few blocks away. Recently, there had been snow, just enough to muss up the streets; they would crowd each other as they stepped around slush-puddles, moving out of the way of passersby. Jo liked to heel her, to stay alongside with her hands in her pockets. Because Stella didn't have a proper one, she wore one of Jo's coats, an almost formal dark grey wool that went down to Stella's knees. Though the coat so obviously didn't fit, the shoulders gaping, Stella liked how warm it was, how there was a rip in the lining right at her wrist. As they walked into the therapist's building, Stella toyed with the rip, false silk moving between her shaking fingers.

The therapist was sweet, had a kind face and hair pulled back in a loose ponytail; she asked Stella about the attack, and Stella said she didn't remember it all. 

"Were there other times when he did such things to you?" the therapist asked, her notepad abandoned, her hands folded on her lap. She wore casual pants, a workout kind of material, as if she had taught an easy yoga class right before coming here. Her office, done up in calming blue tones, was themed to remind patients of the beach, a glass bottle full of pink-flecked sand left as decor on a side-table. Stella felt oddly compelled to push the bottle over, send it toppling to the floor, see if the thing would break.

"Never choking," Stella gave.

"What would he do, then?"

"Hit me," Stella said, trying to sound detached, hating that she was trying to sound like anything at all. "Fuck me."

"Rape you," the therapist corrected, looking down at her own folded hands.

Stella took a deep, resigned breath.

"Rape me," she confirmed, feeling almost defeated with the word.

"Did he ever act out in public?" the therapist asked.

"No," Stella gave, "he tended to act the opposite."

"Like what?"

"He would wax poetic, make small talk," Stella said. "He was more affectionate in public."

"In what ways?"

"He would kiss me."

"Did he not kiss you in his home?"

"No, never."

"Did you ever wish he would?"

With that question, Stella paused, felt jolted as if she were in a car coming to a quick stop. 

"Yes," she admitted, flustered, uncomfortable. 

For the remainder of the appointment, she could feel her stitches so acutely beneath her bandages, snug against her pants, asking her if she wouldn't mind giving it all another go.

* * *

When Stella left the therapist's office, found Jo sitting in the waiting room, she knew from how Jo's face fell ever-so-slightly that something was wrong.

"How'd it go?" Jo asked, but she was using a softer tone, one that gave away her demeanor. Stella had always been able to see through adults trying to coax her.

"Fine," Stella gave. 

Though it was lunchtime, Stella wasn't hungry, so as Jo led them both out of the building, back to the street, Stella declined the meal options, not in the mood for a cafe or a sit-down place, not looking for a cup of coffee, sandwich, or anything else.

"Well, I'm starved," Jo gave, the cold making her breaths puff out beyond her lips. "Something light maybe?"

"Can't we just eat at home?" Stella asked, feeling defeated. 

"You know we don't have groceries," Jo said, slipping her hands in her pockets, looking out at the snowy shopfronts around them.

Stella had always liked London, had loved the weekend trips with Daddy to Harrod's. Whenever they went to the toy floor, there was always a new Steiff calling her name, something he would give her as a present for no particular occasion. Though her mother had sold most of them while Stella was at boarding school, Stella had taken a stuffed bear away with her, the only remaining member of her collection now in a cardboard box at Jo's. Sometimes, Stella would see the kitties and bunnies in shop windows and think it would be worth not eating for a week, maybe a few, if she could just hug one of them once. 

They were walking in the wrong direction.

"I just want to go home," Stella said.

"But what will we do there?" Jo asked.

"I don't know," Stella gave. 

"What did you do when you used to go home?"

Stella went to speak but stopped herself.

"And that's what we're avoiding," Jo said. "Let's go to the park. There's a stand there that makes those little Dutch pancakes."

Jo lead them through the streets, right to the snow-covered park, the place odd and sullen, no leaves on the trees and few people in sight. Midday, during the week, there wouldn't be children or people out strolling on the plowed path; instead, there would be empty metal benches, untouched snow where in summer there would be picnic blankets. In between branches, snow had caught. Stella liked the look of it, black bark next to pure white snow, the contrast stark and almost chilling. 

Blood in the snow, broken glass, footprints that grew sloppy the farther they went from the house. She'd used a cigar box to break a window, then escaped through the window, cutting herself up in the process. Maybe that had been the first time, in some kind of fucked up way. From then on, she would associate relief with a sensation of bleeding, a bleeding that she had caused herself; if she felt trapped again, all she needed to do was bleed in order to feel alright. It felt like a setup, as if she'd been forced into this kind of life for a cruel reason that she would never know. How would the religious explain this, that God had sent her a challenge? No, God hadn't sent a challenge; God had sent her a man, a violent, narcissistic, woman-hating man who had kept her alive at a cost, and God had given her a mother who wouldn't mind learning of her own child's death, and God had sent her a sister who would be complicit the whole time, caring more for their horses than she did for her own flesh and blood. There would never be any justice, for there was no way to serve such a thing, no satisfaction in a life lived better. If she pulled through, she would still be battered, still abandoned, still just a girl who had lost her father and, in turn, lost her only way to survive.

But the snow here was untouched, alarmingly solid. Slowing down, Stella knelt, touched the banks alongside the path, while Jo walked forward. Between her fingers, the clusters of snow were cold and wet, making her hands sting with the change in temperature. Certain neurological problems caused people to feel as if their fingers were wet, the nerves going awry. When she'd had to have an M.R.I. done with contrast, she'd felt that wetness on her hands even though her fingers had been dry, and she could remember the sensation, one of falling forward, snow on her face and legs, and she'd worn a dress, why had she worn a dress? Because he liked it when she wore dresses, that was why, he hated pants and thought they made women look unfeminine, and he bought her nice dresses, _beautiful_  dresses, expensive ones from the high-end department stores that only offered prices upon request, no tags present. At the time, bloody from the broken glass and breathing heavily from the compression to her neck, she hadn't pictured herself wearing a dress, had seen herself instead as one of those Olympic women on a track, legs kicking, eyes filled with a determined fire. But she'd fallen, and her cuts stung with the snow, and she looked up at the neighbors' house, their lights on, and knew that it was so close, _so_  close, close enough that she could make it but not close enough that they would know she was there, outside, in the snow, struggling to breathe, feeling as if her neck would cave in at any moment. When she saw the scene, the snow hanging in the dark trees, the warm light coming from another house, the near-starless sky, her cut-up feet, her blood, trails of her own blood, she knew that the shock was what she needed. She needed to get up. She needed to get up and _go._  With one look at her, the neighbors would know something was wrong, and they would call for help. If she got to the neighbors, then he wouldn't kill her tonight. _He won't kill you tonight._

She fell twice more in the memory, then once in the present, face-first into the snow, knees buckling. Only when Jo went to make conversation with Stella did she realize that Stella was no longer walking with her; with a look back, Jo panicked, was on Stella in a second, pulling her up. Thankfully, the park was empty enough that, as Jo sat in the snowbank and pulled Stella up onto her lap and against her chest, no one noticed or stared.

"Holy shit," Jo said in an anxious hush, her breath hot against Stella's face, her arms tight around Stella. "What just happened?"

Looking up at Jo, Stella felt her vision grow hazy, Jo's soft eyes blurring before her. There was sweat on Stella's brow, even in the cold. She could feel her own hands shaking. 

Stella grabbed for one of Jo's arms, something solid, something to hang onto. Sighing, Jo pushed hair from Stella's face, dried the sweat on her brow, held her there.

"We can go home," Jo said quietly, apologetically. "It's going to be alright."

* * *

The V.C.R. was temperamental; Jo had to shove the tape in four times in order for the box to start working, and even then, there was the matter of the _wires,_  of how they always seemed to come undone. Though Jo knew how the oven worked, could put together some baked macaroni and cheese with the last of their groceries from the past week, she had to wrestle with the television, as she would with every electronic device that she and Stella would encounter together.

"My tape collection is sparse," Jo gave as she sat alongside Stella on the couch.

"How many do you have?" Stella asked.

Once they'd arrived back home, they'd put on pajamas, letting the day end early; there were going to watch _The Sound of Music,_  having dinner at the intermission of the film. 

"Three," Jo answered as she slid underneath Stella's blanket, the two of them sharing the warmth. 

"Three?" Stella said with surprise. "That's next to none!"

"I don't watch television much!"

The opening credits were on; Stella looked to Jo, asked, "What are the other two, then?"

" _Mary Poppins_  and _The Wizard of Oz._ "

"Really?" Stella said with a laugh. "Just classics?"

"You don't need any others if you've got good ones!" Jo countered.

"Tell me, do you like Julie Andrews?"

"Oh," Jo said with a smile, "shove it."

After the movie ended, after their dishes were cast off on the coffee-table, they were tangled together beneath the blanket, Stella leaning against Jo, Jo's arm wrapped around her. Stella closed her eyes, let out a deep breath, nestled there. Beyond the window, the world had grown a wintertime kind of dark; inside, they were warm and safe, no one coming for them, no one looking to hurt them. Though the afternoon had felt treacherous, Stella couldn't remember a time in recent memory when she had been able to go home and feel safe there. 

"What happened today," Jo said, voice soft, tone quiet, "do you want to talk about it?"

Stella shook her head against Jo.

"Is there anything I should know?" Jo asked. "Going forward, I mean. Is there anything I can do to make this easier?"

"I'm not sure there's any way to make it easier," Stella gave.

"I shouldn't have taken you through the park," Jo apologized. "I should've just-"

"No, you were right to do that," Stella said, nodding. "It was a good idea."

"Yes, until it wasn't."

"Neither of us could have predicted that would happen."

"It can't be easy talking about these things with someone."

"No," Stella gave, exhaling, "it isn't easy."

"But it will help," Jo said with conviction. "It's going to be hard, but it'll help."

"I know," Stella said. 

For a while, they were quiet there, just keeping warm, just taking each other in. It was so much easier to have someone else there, to not be alone at night. When she woke from nightmares now, Stella knew that she was protected, that no one could hurt her here, and Stella had overhead enough phone calls of Jo's to know that there was an ex, an uncomfortable one, someone with whom reparations would never be made even though both parties were still trying to make them. There was a lot to be said about not having to go through something alone.

"She asked me if he'd ever kissed me at home," Stella gave, the sentence uncomfortable to say aloud. 

"May I ask if he did?"

"No, he never did."

Jo nodded, not speaking.

"I think I wanted him to love me," Stella said, elaborating even though Jo hadn't asked. "I think it would've made more sense, or it would've made me feel as if there was a point to it."

"A point?"

"Beyond money," Stella gave. "Like if he found out that I only stayed with him for the money, he would be angry with me but also sad about it all. Like he would have been crushed underneath it all."

"That's an understandable way to feel," Jo said. "We all want to be loved."

"But it's fucked up," Stella said. "He hurt me. I shouldn't want him to love me. It's such...it makes me feel disgusting."

"You're not disgusting," Jo insisted. 

"Then what am I? Stupid, for wanting that? Selfish? Naive?"

"You wanted to be loved," Jo said. "For that, you were human."

Stella quieted, accepting that reasoning, calming down.

"You're going to have fucked up thoughts and emotions all your life," Jo said. "You're allowed to have them. Everyone has them. But what differentiates you from that man is that he had no respect and value for other people. You have those things, and they've built you into a resilient, kindhearted person who, in the wake of your situation, asked for no more than support and love. There's nothing fucked up about that."

"I exploited him for money," Stella insisted, blushing with embarrassment. 

"Did you have any other options?"

"No, I didn't."

"Then I think you're absolved of any guilt you have about that."

Stella paused for a moment, then nodded, taking the statement in. Was it really that simple, to accept the mistake for what it was? She couldn't have prevented it, had had no other option to choose, aside from obvious morbidity. There was no guilt in what she had done, and if she felt that there was, that guilt was self-created. Could it really be that simple?

"I don't know what I'll do if what happened today happens again," Stella admitted, trying to shift the topic.

"If anything happens while I'm not here, call me at work, alright?" Jo said. "Even if you can handle it yourself."

"I will," Stella promised, "but I still don't know what I'll do, regardless of whether or not you're here."

"Bring it up with your therapist at your next session," Jo said, "and in the meantime, we'll work through it together."

"Okay," Stella said. 

"Do you want to stay with me tonight?" Jo asked. "If you feel like it might happen again."

Though Stella had had nightmares since moving in with Jo, she hadn't had anything like today's flashback since before she'd begun her near-fatal form of coping. If it did happen again, she wasn't sure she could trust herself, wasn't sure she would know how to cope otherwise.

"Yes," Stella gave, "I would, if that's alright."

"It's more than alright," Jo said. "King-size, more than enough room."

"Okay."

But for now, they didn't need to go to bed together, could stay right where they were, the tape in need of rewinding, empty macaroni bowls sitting on the table in front of them. Alongside Stella, Jo was solid and warm, a grounding comfort. Even if all of this was hard, unreasonably so, it would get better. Stella deeply believed it would get better. Eventually, she and Jo would be able to walk through the park together, and nothing would keep them from having a lighthearted time, absolutely nothing. There were good things to come. With enough work, Stella could move past this, could find ways of living that didn't leave scars on her legs. With enough work, she could heal.

"Tell me when you want to get up," Jo said softly.

"Okay," Stella gave, knowing they wouldn't get up for a long time. 


	18. Interlude: Milk and Cookies

At her next swim meet, Bedelia placed third.

"Just not your day," Margaret gave as she passed Bedelia a towel, one Bedelia begrudgingly took.

"My shoulder is bothering me," Bedelia said, wrapping herself up, not bothering with hushed tones or simplistic conversation. In the end, the whole team would know, even if the pain went away in just a few minutes. Ever since that Sunday morning, the girls had been looking at her with a combination of pity and lack of interest, a sense that they each would be upset if their own fathers died but that they didn't much care that Bedelia's had. Now, when Bedelia needed a circuits partner during dry-land practices, everyone else on the team would freeze momentarily until one person stepped forward, gave a too-soft glance, and offered camaraderie in a sugar-coated way. Bedelia wished they would all disappear.

Margaret looked toward Bedelia's back, said, "Let me see." 

But Bedelia didn't want to pull the towel off. Nowadays, swim practices made her feel too exposed, too uncovered, to the point that she'd contemplated purchasing swim shorts. Though she was confident in her body, had flaunted the unshaven legs and underarms long enough to stop caring about such looks, she wanted to pull something around herself, to cover herself with a long sweater or a blanket, something that would mean her every bit wasn't exposed to the other girls. If someone's nipples were too visible, girls on the team made fun of that, but of course, they would never make fun of Bedelia for anything, or only would behind closed doors. She pulled the best times but was still an outsider. She wished everyone would stop pretending to be inclusive.

Reluctantly, Bedelia pulled the towel away from her shoulder, dropped it back onto the team's segment of the bleachers. The assistant coach was getting into place at the pool's lanes, ready for one of the seniors who had a tattoo on the back of her neck to take the diving platform. Bedelia thought the tattoo was ugly.

"I'm going to press around," Margaret said. "Tell me if it hurts, alright?"

But Bedelia didn't need to speak out, not when just one press meant she hissed in pain. All the past week, her shoulder had been causing pain, both during swim practices and during the school day, but she hadn't felt compelled to speak out. _It's just overuse,_  she'd kept telling herself. If there was a real problem, she would have known.

"That bad?" Margaret asked, pressing again; Bedelia flinched once more at the touch.

"Yeah, that bad."

"It's swimmer's shoulder," Margaret said, pulling the towel back up over Bedelia. "Rest it and ice for the remainder of the weekend. You're not the type to get third twice."

She wasn't, and she knew that. 

"You want a pill?" Margaret asked.

"A pill."

"You know, Advil."

Would that help? Bedelia didn't know.

"Yeah, alright," Bedelia gave, so Margaret headed over to where all of the girls had left their backpacks, to where her own coaching bag, full of basic first-aid, sat. The girl doing the butterfly stroke had fallen into fourth and probably wouldn't pull up anytime soon. _Obviously,_  Bedelia thought. Last night, she'd caught that girl in the locker rooms on campus, having some boy from another school give it to her on the never-washed floors. Those floors had always been sticky, and back when the other girls still talked to Bedelia, they would berate her for wearing shoes at all times while in the locker rooms. No amount of Summer's Eve and dumb hope could undo what an inexperienced boy and a hard, tiled floor could do. 

"What the fuck are you doing here?" the girl had shouted last night, angry and red-faced. "Get the fuck out!" 

And Bedelia had left with her face going pale, her hands shaking with anxiety, until the fantastic thought struck her. _She just treated me as if my father isn't dead._

For the remainder of the weekend, she iced and rested, staying in her bedroom and doing translations for Madame. Outside her dorm's window, snow had started to fall, fat flakes covering the roads. She liked the view from her dorm's window, one of a school garden heading toward the campus' outer walls, then a street with little Connecticut cottage-style homes lining it. Right before winter break, she'd been able to see a Christmas tree through the windows of one house, the white lights twinkling from day until night, someone coming home every day to check the mail and then head inside to where everything was warm and cozy. Someday, she wanted a house like that, somewhere that she could call a home. Though she didn't think a cottage would suit her, and though she doubted she would ever want another Christmas tree, she still wanted somewhere that felt good to come home to, somewhere that felt like her own. She wanted to feel that somewhere was home again, not just a place to store her suitcase until a new offer was presented to her. She wanted somewhere to live, not stay.

Two fast knocks came on her dorm room's door, so she furrowed her brow, looked up at the glass paneling at the top of the door. Though the glass was speckled, impossible to see through, she could nonetheless see a human outline beyond the glass, so she stood, ice still on her shoulder, expecting some faculty member to be coming by to question her about her _mental state_. Dorm staff did it all the time, coming by just to _check in,_  acting as if they suddenly cared that Bedelia existed at all. At first, Bedelia had been uncomfortable with the questions, the piteous glances, but now, she played these like a game, trying as hard as she could to seem as if she didn't realize they were there because her father was dead. She would defer the questioning, ask if they'd checked in on the other girls, say that Sadie down the hall just had a _bad_  breakup and could use some moral support. None of the faculty members wanted to outright say _your father is dead,_  so Bedelia would taunt them, try to make them say it. So far, only one person had said it, a senior prefect who had blushed horrendously afterward; Bedelia was looking to make that one into a two.

At the door was a girl Bedelia recognized but just barely, some exchange student, only there for a month and a half. Oftentimes, students from sister schools abroad would drop in and out for a little American experience. Though Bedelia didn't understand the programs, didn't get how they could be beneficial, it was nice to have attention cycle around the school to some new girl, someone who would be gone in just a few weeks. So long as there was a new exchange student, no full-time student's embarrassing moments would stay within gossip circulation for long.

"Hello," the girl said. She had long, dark hair, so mousy that it seemed grey. Even though it was early afternoon, she was wearing a nightgown, white and long-skirted, with a big sweater over top. "French?"

Confused, Bedelia gave, "Yeah?"

"No, French," the girl said. "You speak, yes?"

"Yes," Bedelia said.

" _Parfait._ "

The girl pushed past Bedelia, came into Bedelia's room without invitation, sat down on Bedelia's ornately-made bed. Back when Bedelia began at the school, her mother had bought her a proper sheet set, the covers white with little pink accents, equal parts overly feminine and childish. Bedelia had ripped the pink parts off her sophomore year, and now, the bedspread looked messy and lived-in, not up to par with Bedelia's standards but at least not pink. 

" _Je suis Mathilde,_ " the girl said. "Mathilde, my name is. French, English?"

"English," Bedelia gave, eyeing her translations for Madame. She wasn't in the mood for anything French right now.

"You must teach me swears." Mathilde tapped Bedelia's bed. "Sit."

Reluctantly, with the ice still wrapped around her shoulder, Bedelia sat down on the twin mattress, keeping a foot of distance between them. Mathilde had pretty eyes, blue but a little lifeless. Her sweater was woolly and thick, something one would wear if this building were much colder than it actually was.

"Ice? Already cold," Mathilde pointed out, regarding Bedelia's shoulder.

"Yeah," Bedelia gave.

"Swears," Mathilde insisted.

"I don't..." Bedelia took a deep breath, gave, "We've never met before."

Mathilde rolled her eyes, backed up, gave, "I am French exchange student. Brigitte, she tell me, yes, this girl, she speaks French very well, not like other girls. You have French mother, yes?"

"Yes," Bedelia said. 

"Your mother, she is Paris?"

"Strasbourg, I believe," Bedelia said. "Or she was, at least."

"Strasbourg." Mathilde scrunched up her face. "Deutschland, not France."

Bedelia had never learned exactly where Strasbourg was, so maybe, for all she knew, her mother was German. Regardless of that, she wasn't in the mood to think of her mother.

"What else did Madame Beaumont say?" Bedelia asked.

"That I shall speak with you," Mathilde said. "You will help with my English."

"With swears?"

Slowly, Mathilde's face bloomed to a smile, one with bottom teeth that weren't straight. 

"I know one," Mathilde said. " _Fuck you_. In New York, cabbie taught me. Say with growl: _Fuck you!_ "

"And that's it?" Bedelia asked.

"Yes," Mathilde said. "Tell me others."

"Do you even know my name?"

"Your name, I cannot say."

"It's Bedelia."

"No, I cannot say. I cannot speak it."

Understanding what Mathilde meant, Bedelia gave a humorless laugh, said, "Neither can my mother."

"I have been Strasbourg one time," Mathilde said, then stood, walked toward Bedelia's window. "There are... _qu'est-ce que c'est en Anglais, une fleuve?_ "

"River?"

" _Yes,_ " Mathilde said, "river. There is river."

"Is it pretty?"

" _No,_ " Mathilde emphasized. 

Undoing the hatches, Mathilde pushed open the window, let cold, snowy air into the room. Bedelia grimaced, asked, "What are you doing?"

From a pocket in her sweater, Mathilde pulled a pack of cigarettes, a lighter. She proffered one to Bedelia, the thing strange and alien in her hands. "You want?"

"You're not allowed to smoke here," Bedelia said, shaking her head. "There's disciplinary action taken if anyone finds out, even if anyone just finds _cigarettes_  in your room."

"What is this, discipline?" Mathilde asked, not understanding. 

Bedelia huffed a breath, gave, "We don't do that here."

"Over here?"

"No, _here._  At school."

"I do this. My roommate, she say nothing."

"Your roommate, does she join in?" 

" _Parfois_."

Bedelia rolled her eyes, stood up went to the window, snatched the cigarette from Mathilde's hand. The air coming in made Bedelia wince as Mathilde took another cigarette from the pack, left the pack on the windowsill. She lit the cigarette with practiced ease, took a puff in the way Bedelia's mother did. 

"You need light," Mathilde said, taking Bedelia's hands in hers, leaving the cigarette in her own mouth. 

She lit the cigarette for Bedelia, went back to her own for another puff. Holding the burning cigarette between her fingers, Bedelia looked down at the smoking tip, thought of her mother and her little green boxes of Gauloises, thought of Sunday breakfast on the outdoor patio, the cloud of smoke colliding with rare English sunshine. Daddy had smoked a pipe instead, sitting in his study with the windows open, the place always smelling of old books, humid air, leather, and tobacco. Sometimes, she would find herself in the older sections of the library on campus and discover that aroma again, unsettled by how it could travel from one continent to another. 

"Don't waste!" Mathilde said on an exhale, blowing air out the window, flicking the cigarette beyond the panes as if the whole world were her ashtray. 

Flustered, Bedelia admitted, "I've never done this before."

Mathilde laughed deliciously, almost evilly, and took the cigarette from between Bedelia's fingers, brought it to Bedelia's lips.

"Take into your chest," Mathilde said, then demonstrated on her own. "Hold, one second. Let go."

Bedelia tried breathing in, but the smoke hurt against her throat, and she ended up choking on it, the cigarette hitting the floor in front of her, Mathilde's giggles coming back as Bedelia braced herself against the wall.

"Pick that up!" Mathilde insisted. "Not good."

Bedelia took in a deep breath, looked to the smoking French girl in her room, agreed, "Not good."

"You teach me swears," Mathilde gave, "I teach you smoke. Capisce?" 

Looking down, Bedelia watched the tip of the cigarette mar the floorboards, leaving a permanent form of punctuation. Mathilde extended her arm out long, left her pale fingers dangling outside of the window, tapped the cigarette twice with cinematic grace. Their school, built in the early twentieth century, was insulated with New York Times and hay. During every fire drill, teachers would remind students that the whole building could burn down in only eight minutes. 

"Capisce," Bedelia gave, then reached down for the cigarette. 

"So, why don't I know you already?" Mathilde asked. "Brigitte, she say, this girl is not social. She swims, and no more!"

Bedelia looked back down at the cigarette, decided to give it another try even though her throat still ached from the last one. This time, she managed to breathe in but didn't hold the breath for long enough to feel anything. Why did people do this if there was such a learning curve?

"I really just swim," Bedelia gave.

"Why just swim?"

"Because I love it."

"Why?"

"It's made me strong," Bedelia said, tapping her cigarette out the window like Mathilde had. "It's what I'm good at."

Mathilde rolled her eyes, unsatisfied, and asked, " _And?_ "

On the street below, someone parked their car in front of the Christmas tree house, the vehicle's lights going off in a cinematic succession. The roads were still snowy. Maybe, on Monday, school would be closed, the roads too slick for the day students to come to class. 

"My best friend was on the team," Bedelia gave. 

"Was? Past?"

"Yes, past."

"Why past?"

Bedelia sighed, gave, "She betrayed me."

"What is this, betrayed?"

"She did something bad."

"Oh, sleep with your boyfriend?"

"What?" Bedelia asked, flustered. "No, of course not."

"Then what?" Mathilde insisted.

"She gossiped about me."

"Everyone here gossips."

"This was something unkind to gossip about."

"Which was?"

"My father died."

"And what did she say?"

"She just told everyone," Bedelia gave. "And I didn't want anyone to know."

"Teenage girls," Mathilde scoffed. "They...they have small minds."

Bedelia looked down at the cigarette. If Margaret knew that Bedelia had so much as been in the same room as someone who was smoking, she would have been indescribably angry. She would have threatened to cut Bedelia from the team. She might even have gone to the administration and asked for Bedelia to be suspended. 

"Small minds," Bedelia agreed, then brought the cigarette back to her lips.

* * *

For February break, Bedelia flew home alone, the international student vans taking her to the airport. She had stopped spending her free hours in Margaret's classroom, had kept to her dormitory instead and therefore never given Margaret an opportunity to ask if Bedelia needed a ride. While all of the other students spoke in languages Bedelia didn't understand, Bedelia sat alone again, looking out at the Connecticut countryside that the van passed by. Because of her shoulder, her swim practice periods had been spent on a stationary bike in the gym, forcing her to be next to two injured basketball girls who couldn't stop talking about boy bands. Luckily, however, not going to the pool meant that Bedelia didn't have to see Margaret as often. 

When the driver parked in front of the English estate, Bedelia looked out on the place, all snow-dusted and old, filled with rooms and bathrooms and guestrooms and libraries, some of the ceilings painted in ornate ways. Out back, the stables were hidden behind the main building, an almost modest gesture, but she could see the horse fences nonetheless, the setups of old jumps. When Daddy had been well, they'd had proper settings for dressage, places where Bedelia would trot as long as she and the horse pleased. She'd always liked the jumps best, liked the feeling of setting each one up, sensing every motion, being so entwined with the horse that she could sense its every movement. Had she not been a swimmer, she would've tried equestrian in high school, the minuscule team made up of a few girls who would go to a local stable and care for other people's horses. It wouldn't have been enough, but it could have been something.

On the front steps to the house, Stella stood waiting, wearing one of her girlish peacoats, a ribbon tied at the end of her braid. Though she and Bedelia shared so many looks, Stella still had a baby face, not plump but still childish, her skin clear and pale, her eyes wide and blue. She had the most delicate eyelashes, long and light. Standing there, she looked lost, like someone had abandoned her on some neighboring family's doorstep. 

"Mum's in London," Stella gave as Bedelia walked toward the steps, her lightweight traveling shoes sinking into the snow. 

Yes, _Mum._  That wasn't what Bedelia called their mother. 

"I'm going to bake cookies," Stella said as Bedelia breezed past her, the driver carrying the suitcase in. "Would you like some?"

Passing by the entryway, the sitting room, Bedelia found that some of the furniture was missing, just a few chairs and end-tables, the good dishes out of the proper chest. The kitchen was empty, no cook or nannies to be found. On the railing to the stairs, Bedelia could see a layer of dust, something she could drag her finger through and leave a trace upon. Though the house was big, all ornately done in proper decor, Bedelia could still make a beeline for her bedroom, find her way there with ease; she rounded a corner, passed where a painting used to be hung, pulled open her unadorned bedroom door, and sneaked inside. As always, everything was as she'd left it, the maids having kept the door closed and left the room to look out for itself. At the end of her bed, she hung all of her equestrian ribbons, many blues but some reds, the trophies lining the top of her bookcase. She had medals hanging on a rack above her armoire, half of them from horseback riding and the other half from high school swimming. On the desk, a photograph of her whole family - a rare one, given that the four of them had hardly ever been in the same room together, not even at meals, not even on holidays - was turned face-down. Her curtains - white, wispy things that matched her bedspread - were drawn, so she opened them up, looked out at the rest of the estate. Though staring straight showed her mostly forest and sky, she could look down to see the stables, the pastures, the beginnings of trails; she liked being able to wake up and see the horses first thing in the morning, a few out trotting, swishing their tails and extending their long, beautiful necks. Sometimes, that view in the morning felt as if it was all she had to look forward to. 

For now, the horses weren't out, so she decided to head down to the stables, to put on her winter boots and trudge through the snow. She was too jet-lagged to change her clothes, too tired to ride, but she wanted to see the horses, felt a desperate yearning to run the palm of her hand through their hair, to feel the downy softness beneath her fingers. After her long week of training, the challenging months at school, everything she'd faced with Margaret, she needed to feel reset, redeemed. She needed someone to understand.

In the hallway, she passed Stella, who said, "Mum left a few boxes in the kitchen for you."

Bedelia stopped, looked back at her sister, asked, "Boxes?"

"For packing."

Stella stood there with her hands clasped, wearing a winter dress, long-sleeved and woolen, itchy. Something their mother had purchased, Bedelia surmised. 

"Packing what?" Bedelia asked.

"Did she not tell you?"

"Tell me what?"

Stella seemed to look over Bedelia's shoulder, as if asking permission, so Bedelia glanced that way but found no one standing there. 

"They're selling," Stella said. "She wants you to take all of the things you'd like to keep back to school with you."

Bedelia paused, the message not quite sinking in, the context nonsensical.

"Are we moving?" she asked. 

She wouldn't mind a move. Now, the whole house seemed to reek of Daddy, of all of his past possessions and of all of his strange, masculine life. This wasn't a house for three girls.

"No," Stella gave, "not all of us."

"Then what's going on?"

"She's selling the house," Stella said, "and I think she wants to be by you now. Neither of us is living at home anyway. I think she's been trying to get an apartment in New York."

New York. Her mother couldn't move to New York. If her mother moved to New York, then Bedelia would no longer be a sea away; instead, she'd be a two-hour drive, maybe an hour-and-a-half by train, away. Her mother couldn't move to New York. And how would Bedelia fit all of her things in a dorm room? Her clothes, her medals, her ribbons-

_No._

"What about the horses?" Bedelia asked, her mind going anxiously blank. 

Stella went to speak but held back, tried to find words, and with that, Bedelia pushed past her, raced down the dusty stairways, shoved her boots on as she went outside. Even before she reached the stables, she felt tears coming to her eyes, but nonetheless, she knew it all wouldn't be true until she saw it, _really_  saw it. She tore open the front door, raced inside, and as she had expected, each of the stalls was empty, the tack supplies gone, no spare shoes or reigns or anything else hanging. As she looked into the stalls individually, desperately searching for even one horse to remain, all she saw were bare boards, no hay in sight, the whole place having been professionally cleaned long ago. When she came to the last stall, she stopped for a moment, remembering this horse in particular, an English Thoroughbred who her father had purchased just around Bedelia's twelfth birthday, not for Bedelia but with Bedelia in mind. _She'll grow old with us,_  he'd said, somehow hopeful and optimistic. Bedelia couldn't help wondering if he'd gotten poor news at the time, if that had been when his health had gone from bad to dire. Back then, he would stroke this horse's mane, look into her big, dark eyes and smile, feeling that understanding that Bedelia so greatly longed for. Maybe that was all of his genetics that she'd acquired, just the love for these horses, the distinct caring for each and every one of them. Even now, she could name each stall's former inhabitant, and in the proper order. Even after she'd gone off to high school, she'd still made sure she knew which horses they boarded, which new ones were coming their way.

But this Thoroughbred, Bedelia had ridden her many times, the horse beautiful on jumps and sweet through the trails on their property. When Bedelia and Stella would go riding together, Bedelia tended toward this horse while Stella opted for a Welsh Mountain pony, beautiful and snowy white, just a bit shorter than the other horses and therefore the proper height for Stella; they would trot through the woods together, abandoning their helmets at a certain tree each time because wild girls didn't wear those, finding their way to a certain spot that made them feel so far away from their home and everyone else in it. They used to have a name for that spot, one Bedelia couldn't remember, and they would stay there for hours, sitting silently and taking in nature, brushing burrs out of tails and manes, feeling alone and free but safe, given that they could look out for each other. Sometimes, Bedelia would fantasize that she was a nomadic girl, riding her horse from place to place, staying in the homes of kind people who made her warm, hearty soup for dinner, learning folktales and sleeping on hay-filled mattresses and taking only what her saddlebags could carry. Though she knew she must've conjured that image up from some Western movie, she wanted to think it was a fantasy of her own making, that it was how she would live if the world weren't so cruel.

But the world was cruel, and when she looked into the stall, the horse wasn't there. Her name had been Dynamo, a name that Bedelia had at first hated but eventually grown to love, especially because of how it felt rolling off of her tongue. _Dynamo._  The stall had been swept and washed so cleanly that no one would ever be able to tell that a beautiful, dark-coated horse once stood there, flicking her tail and huffing at Bedelia, every day just as anxious as Bedelia was to get out on the trails. 

Bedelia forced herself into the stall, collapsed into its corner, bent her knees so that she could lean her forehead against them. Trying to breathe, she thought of riding Dynamo, of taking her out for a trot, of looking down from her window to see the horse chewing grass in the pastures. She thought of the horse's red plaid coat, used in the colder months, a pretty contrast to her dark hair. She thought of Stella's Welsh pony, of the horses they boarded for other families, of her friend Edie who would come riding sometimes, of the trails on this estate that would be used by other people, different people, people who weren't Bedelia and her sister. Who would live here next, a rich man and his younger wife, a family of four whose father would die while the two girls were still little? No one else was good enough to live here. This was Bedelia's home, it was _hers,_  and she couldn't let it go, not now. This was where she was supposed to see the horses each morning, where she was supposed to have her one last minute of calm before the treacherous day began. This was supposed to be her salvation, and now, they were all abandoning it. They were abandoning this country altogether. She would never see any of the horses again.

 _I never even got to say goodbye,_  she thought, going weightless against the stall as she wept. 

* * *

When Bedelia came back into the house, she couldn't feel her hands or feet, and the exhaustion was all-encompassing, the whole day making her feel as if she could barely walk upstairs. The house was dark, quiet, seeming almost abandoned. If Maman had sold the horses, then she must've let the house staff go, so for now, it was just Bedelia and Stella in the house, their mother off doing whatever she wanted to do in London. Distantly, Bedelia could see that the kitchen's lights were on, and the scent of warm sugar hung in the air like an afterthought, like the scent of blown-out birthday candles from a party she hadn't been invited to. Though she wanted to go back to her room, to be alone, she hadn't had any dinner, doubted she would find any beyond what Stella could offer, so she walked toward the kitchen, steps achingly heavy. She wasn't sure she would ever feel warm again.

Stella wasn't in the kitchen, but there was a cooling rack full of cookies sitting on top of the oven, all warm and filled with chocolate chips. Looking toward the dining room, Bedelia caught Stella's eye, so Stella stood up, headed to the kitchen, went into the ornately-carved cabinets in order to get out some of the last remaining Lenox plates. With a spatula, Stella stacked a pile of cookies on the plate for Bedelia, then passed them to her sister. 

"Go sit down at the table," Stella said. "I'll fetch you a glass of milk."

So Bedelia went into the dining room, just a few steps away, and sat down at the long mahogany table, surprised that this set, with its matching chairs, hadn't been sold yet. Refusing to face the windows, all of which looked out at the empty stables, she stared toward the kitchen, where Stella stood on tiptoe to reach for a glass. Alongside Bedelia, Stella's plate and glass sat, the milk half-drunk, some cookies remaining but mostly just crumbs. When Stella returned, she set down the glass in front of Bedelia's plate, then sat alongside her sister. 

Silently, Stella took one of the cookies off of her plate, tore it in half so that she could dip it in her glass of milk. Daddy used to leave such plates and glasses out for Stella while he worked, letting her sit on one of the wide window-seats in his office while he worked; he would take breaks to entertain her but would always go back to his work, mulling over financial reports, all things Bedelia could never understand. By now, his office had probably been torn apart, the library too. When she went back to her room, Bedelia would need to check what things remained of hers, if their mother had sold the more expensive items already. There wasn't much that she valued; though she admired her ribbons and medals, she didn't feel an ache when she thought of losing them, not like what she would have felt if her copy of _Black Beauty,_  tucked safely in a dorm room drawer, had been given away.

Stella took a bite of her half-cookie, then looked to Bedelia, eyed her sister's plate. Swallowing, Stella asked, "Are you going to eat those?"

"Yes," Bedelia gave, though she made no effort to keep her word.

"I'm sorry that this came as a shock," Stella said, sounding as if she had genuine remorse. "I thought Mum had told you."

"Did she tell you before you came home?"

Bedelia knew that her voice sounded scratchy, that her eyes were red-rimmed and her skin blotchy. Though she didn't want to look this way in front of anyone, at least Stella didn't look at her piteously. At least Stella acted as if Bedelia were the same as always.

"No, she didn't," Stella resigned. 

Taking to the plate, Bedelia picked up a warm cookie, the chocolate chips leaving a melted stain on her fingers. 

"They were gone when I got here too," Stella said, "for what that's worth."

Forcibly, Bedelia dunked her cookie in the milk, trying not to ball her fist.

"I'm scared," Stella gave, voice growing smaller, more childlike. 

Bedelia sighed out a breath, said, "Me too."

She bit, chewed, swallowed, the motions mechanical. Though she wasn't appetized, she needed to eat. Her shoulder was growing tight and painful. 

"These are good," Bedelia said, as they were good cookies, all buttery and soft. 

In thanks, Stella offered a small, uncomfortable smile, an understanding look. 

"I did try to save something for you," Stella said, reaching into a pocket of her dress. Stella had a habit of making pockets for herself, tearing out a portion of her dresses and sewing in a sock. Though it drove Maman mad, Bedelia liked that Stella was daring enough to do something like that, to put her own comfort above her mother's petty grievances. Bedelia would never. "It's small, not much, but it's something, I think. I've been carrying it around for...I don't know. Good luck, I suppose. I didn't even cut it myself; there was a patch of it outside before we got this snow, and I knew it was hers, so I picked it up."

From her pocket, Stella pulled a tied-up lock of hair, the cut portion bound together with a piece of twine. Unmistakably, it was hair from Dynamo's mane, trimmed in a fashion that meant that, before the sales, all of the horses had had their manes cut outside. So that was how it all ended, with each of them lined up, each of them going elsewhere, each of them being taken away in trailers, thinking about two little blonde girls until their dying days. Maybe some of them would go on to be fantastic racers, or maybe they would go to family farms, nice places where they were always affectionately brushed. She wanted some little girl to have her horse, to care for her horse as long as Dynamo lived. She hoped they wouldn't choose to rename her.

"Thank you," Bedelia said as Stella handed it to her.

Softly, Bedelia wrapped her hand around the lock of hair, felt the familiar sensation between her fingers. If she closed her eyes, she could pretend that everything was different, that the horses were still in the stables, that she would wake up tomorrow to see a few in the pastures. But that wasn't the reality of it all. She opened her eyes, brought the lock of hair into the pocket of her pants. She could feel its weight there, comforting and grounding, making her feel stronger. 

She reached for another of Stella's cookies, glad for warm food even if it wasn't the best of dinners, glad that she wasn't alone.


	19. You Made Me Soup

For dinner, Bedelia served Japanese ramen, homemade down to the bone broth, the pickled ginger, eggs, beansprouts, and mushrooms all chopped and garnished delicately. 

"Thank you," Stella said as Bedelia set dishes of hoisin and chili garlic sauce alongside Stella's soup bowl.

In the background, some Saint-Saëns that Stella recognized played, the tune sweet and light; the house was dark save for the dining room's lights, and while Bedelia was clearly dressed for dinner, Stella wore pajama bottoms, the only article of clothing that Bedelia would permit against the holster-looking bandages on Stella's leg. Stella had watched her sister put down gauze, rip medical tape with her teeth, fit each piece to Stella's leg with ease, and though Stella had never seen her sister as being one, she was forced to realize that Bedelia was, in fact, a doctor, a medical one, someone who had been through enough training that six scratches were next to nothing to address. Now, Stella could sense Bedelia's bedside manner, the objective, ornate marvel of it; her sister would be nonjudgmental to a point, would work quietly and astutely, and in the end, her work would be remarkable and close to perfect. _It's her,_  Stella thought, stirring her soup with chopsticks too beautiful to ever be put in a takeaway container, _just a side of her that I never knew to look for._

From the opposite side of the dining room table, Bedelia stirred her own bowl of soup. She kept her gaze down, her face taut and emotionless. Though Stella was growing accustomed to Bedelia's emotional control, to the unreadability of her sister's face, Stella knew nonetheless that there must be something stirring in her sister, something uncomfortable, for otherwise, Bedelia would have brought out pleasantries, wouldn't she have? Stella assumed her sister was a good host, that her sister engaged with guests, that Stella's own stay was merely an anomaly, an abnormality. Even if it could be called mistreatment, which Stella knew it couldn't be, the hosting was understandable, perhaps even mutual; had Bedelia been staying in Stella's home, dinner wouldn't even have been on the table, meals never being given a second thought. 

But there was something in Bedelia, something that she wished for Stella not to see. Watching the delicate tremble of her sister's chopsticks, Stella knew that something was wrong. Bedelia had never been a girl whose hands shook.

"I'm sorry," Stella said without thinking, not knowing what she meant, not wishing to start such a conversation.

Bedelia didn't change her expression, instead merely gave, "I don't condone such behaviors."

"I know," Stella said awkwardly. "I normally don't either, but-"

"I would prefer not to discuss this over dinner," Bedelia said, looking up and meeting Stella's gaze with a finite look. This would be the end of the subject, and that was final.

"I really didn't mean for you to see that," Stella kept going, eyes on her sister. "It was a moment of weakness, and-"

"Weakness is finding oneself unable to bear the burden of what they carry." Bedelia's gaze returned to her dinner. "Bingeing and mutilation are purposeful, not weak."

In some way, Stella felt the statement to be validating, as if it confirmed some unspoken truth, but at the same time, Stella couldn't make out what the statement meant, if it condemned her actions or sympathized with them. 

As Bedelia brought the first of the meal to her lips, Stella managed, "I didn't mean to ruin your rug, or to cause a fuss. I know I've been a poor guest. I'm sorry."

Bedelia didn't respond, something Stella should've expected, so Stella digressed, returned to her soup, weighed the noodles on her chopsticks, tried and failed to eat elegantly. So far today, the most she'd had to eat or drink had been water left out for her by Bedelia and coconut water proffered by Bedelia. Because Stella had spent the morning in the bathroom she and Maman shared, retching helplessly and feeling every last drop that she had consumed, she hadn't felt appetized in the least, not when Bedelia found her, not even when Bedelia began to make dinner. However, the scent of the soup drew her in, and with her first mouthful of noodles, she felt her appetite return wholeheartedly, the broth decadent, the vegetables left to be an absolutely perfect texture. 

"This is really good," Stella said to Bedelia, nodding quickly.

Of course, Bedelia didn't respond. 

By the time Bedelia was clearing their plates, Stella could feel a sense of relief, even if the cuts on her leg still stung. Though she was tired, and though she still felt the ache of the day acutely, she was at least fed, and after a warm shower, she could climb into bed and sleep as long as she liked. Tomorrow, they had no plans, the funeral taken care of for the day after, the stresses of being in the United States for now waning from Stella. Reed hadn't called tonight, and there was nothing Stella could do to change that fact. For once, she felt almost above it all, as if none of it had gotten beneath her skin, as if she were completely unattached to how this day would be the last during which her mother was ever alive. Most people died naturally in the small hours of the morning, didn't they? In her anthropology classes, she'd learned through cross-species studies that most animals, including humans and apes, gave birth in the early hours of the morning. It all seemed cosmically fitting for her mother to die in the same timeframe.

Standing from the table, Stella dismissed herself, gave, "I'm going to head in for the evening."

"No."

Furrowing her brow in confusion, Stella looked to where her sister stood in the kitchen, leaving two bowls in the sink.

"No," Stella repeated, asking for clarification.

"Your bedroom is unfit," Bedelia gave, then looked to Stella to say, "and I have no reason to trust you."

Stella paused for a moment, taking the statement in. She couldn't understand how her sister could be so astute and concise yet make minimal sense. In the meantime, Bedelia returned to the dishes, rinsed and sponged them, set each one to dry alongside the sink. Shifting her weight, Stella looked to her sister, didn't know what else to do.

"What do you mean?" Stella asked.

"I mean that you've lost any privacy that I once offered you."

Stepping back into the dining room, still wearing high heels, Bedelia gave, "You will be sleeping within sight of me. I am more than willing to search your luggage for sharps. If you don't comply, I can ensure that you stay elsewhere, but I don't think you would like that option."

At the revelation of what her sister meant, Stella felt her expression grow cold.

"You want me in a hospital," she said, aghast at the concept. "You're threatening me."

"I have a duty to protect," Bedelia gave.

"Yes, to your patients!" Stella turned away, bringing a palm to her forehead, trying not to appear as angry as she felt. "I'm not one of your patients. I'm your sister."

"This is your choice," Bedelia said, brushing the topic off as if it were nothing. "If you bathe, I'll need to bandage your wounds again."

"What, and you'll be watching the whole time, bathroom door open?" Stella shook her head in disbelief. "I'm not going to do it again. I've already said that."

"And why should I believe you?" Bedelia asked, momentarily playing in to Stella's anger. "Because you gave me your word?"

Stella took a deep breath, let it out, wouldn't face her sister. She knew that her word was meaningless to her sister, that it was meaningless to much of anyone. Even if she promised that this would never happen again, no one would feel compelled to believe her, not after having seen her do it once, not with the knowledge that there were times when she couldn't control herself. _But I_ can _control myself,_  she wanted to argue, for she knew that, to a degree, that statement was true; when she wasn't in a foreign country facing her estranged mother's demise, she knew how to cope, would opt for many other things before even considering what she'd done since arriving in the United States. But none of that would mean anything to Bedelia, regardless of its truth. Instead, Bedelia would treat Stella like she would treat any other patient: remove the harmful materials, monitor the client, intervene when necessary. And Bedelia, Stella knew, wouldn't be nice about the intervention.

Turning back toward her sister, Stella swallowed her pride, stared out at the eyes that so unfortunately matched her own. 

"I'm going to take a shower," Stella gave, then headed toward the master bedroom, Bedelia's own space up its own flight of stairs. "And I'll leave every fucking door open."

* * *

They shared the double-sink as they brushed their teeth, Stella taking the largely unoccupied side while Bedelia took to the one lined with La Mer and Drunk Elephant, a small refrigerator fit for only beer cans holding facial serums and other beautiful things. While Stella used the over-the-counter anti-sensitivity stuff, Bedelia used the same toothpaste that their mother used to use, that the whole family would stock up on whenever they could manage a trip to France. For Stella, it felt vaguely triumphant to watch her sister spit.

To bed, Bedelia wore a navy-colored silk slip, one that matched a robe of hers and that had white French lace at its top, while Stella wore cotton pants and a cotton tank. Settling on what was going to be her side of Bedelia's king-sized bed, Stella put down her little alarm clock, her new journal, and her cell phone, all she had managed from her room downstairs before the vomit scent had overwhelmed her enough to get out, Bedelia waiting for her in the room's doorway. Shedding her robe, Bedelia came to bed, checking for an eye-mask on her bedside table, facing away from her sister whlie she pulled the now-shared comforter over herself. Like every room in this horrible house, Bedelia's bedroom had automated lighting and shades, so all Bedelia needed to do was reach for a remote at her bedside in order to dim the lights. 

In the dark, lying on the unharmed side of her body, facing away from her sister, Stella could feel as if she were alone, as if this were her own bed, as if she hadn't spent the day either vomiting or trying to plan a funeral that she had minimal interest in; only when Bedelia shifted did Stella feel once again trapped in this room, being watched overnight because one slip-up meant she wasn't capable of self-control anymore. The stillness helped Stella drift off, but whenever Bedelia shifted - too many times, a restless kind of tossing - Stella found herself awake again, eyes wide open, jet lag and dreadful tiredness returning to her body. She didn't have to check a clock to know that it was far too late for both of them to be awake.

"You can't sleep," Stella gave quietly, a resignation. _This was such a bad idea._

Bedelia took a deep breath, sighed it out slowly. 

"Do you need me to do anything?" Stella asked.

"No," Bedelia gave with ease, with sharpness. Though Stella had known her sister was awake, she hadn't realized that Bedelia was _that_  awake.

"I'm sorry," Stella repeated, as she had been all evening. "I know that this isn't ideal."

"It's fine."

Stella shifted in bed, felt a pull at her wounds. Grimacing, she wished she hadn't done it, wished she could've stopped herself, wished it hadn't been on her mind the whole time they were at the funeral home. This time around, it hadn't even worked, the relief never coming, and she should have known better, should have remembered the times when it hadn't worked over a decade ago, when she'd been forced to find something else. Though she knew that there were healthy ways of halting poor coping mechanisms, she found it much easier to use the bad ones until they ran out, to keep doing the same things over and over again until they hurt more than helped. If she tried to stop herself prematurely, she wouldn't learn and would be tempted again at some point, so if she did it enough, if it became almost quotidian, she could find a way out. However, she'd found her way out many years beforehand, so now, her attempts at using old coping mechanisms were useless, fruitless. What she'd wanted were endorphins, not marks on her leg. Swimming would have provided endorphins. Bedelia even had an indoor poor, for christ's sake. She could have done something else.

When Stella felt the bed shake again, Bedelia shifting once more, she pulled herself from her thoughts and looked back toward her sister. Though the movement was slight, Stella knew it well enough to recognize how her sister lay in bed, how Bedelia's body language communicated what she had been trying to hold in all evening. It had started with shaky chopsticks, and now, Bedelia was a full-bodied kind of anxious, even hours later. 

"Are you alright?" Stella asked uncomfortably.

"Yes," Bedelia gave.

Turning to face away from her sister again, Stella stared blankly to the bedroom's walls, to the dark cast around them. Should she pry? If her sister wouldn't even let her sleep alone, she ought to be able to.

"You're anxious," Stella said, her gaze forward.

With a tired, annoyed tone, Bedelia said, "Stella."

"Tell me what's going on."

" _Stella._ "

"I have had to piss with the door open," Stella said. "You can tell me why you're shaking."

"Because you scared me," Bedelia spat. "I'd like to sleep."

"I scared you hours ago," Stella gave, unbelieving. 

" _Stop._ "

Uncomfortably, Stella quieted, dropped the topic. Before she nestled back in, made a real effort to sleep, she looked down beneath the blankets, pulled back her pajamas to reveal Bedelia's handiwork covering her own. Though there was some blood, it had dried and only slightly stained the gauze. When they were children, Stella had always been the one with the scraped knees, the torn tights; Bedelia had been quieter, an indoor type, someone who kept her riding pants clean and only fell off of her horse in one fantastical moment, a time that had left a whole audience stunned and wondering whether or not this girl would get back up again. But Bedelia always got up. Stella couldn't remember a time when Bedelia had admitted that something physically pained her. Even if Stella wasn't the same way, there was some kind of assurance in knowing that her sister was the last person Stella could think of who would ever turn to drugs for relief. However, Stella could see newfound scars on the back of Bedelia's shoulder, marks only exposed when Bedelia wore that silk slip to bed, and of course, Stella was left to wonder whether or not her sister's white-knuckling was truly admirable. 

It was intimate, Stella knew, to watch someone else bleed. When she'd been on the floor in the interrogation room, Anderson hovering above her and shouting for an ambulance, she'd felt as if she were naked to the world, both physically and spiritually. Then, the people around her could see that this wasn't her first time being touched in that way. Her colleagues could look at her and see a girl of just nineteen, being shoved into a sharp, hardwood dresser by the man, having her head smashed against the brassy knobs until her vision went so blurry that she vomited. And then, of course, he would tell her that she was a bad girl, that she couldn't do anything right. She almost wished he had been the type to apologize afterward, to hold her and tell her that he was so, _so_  sorry, that he hadn't meant it, that sometimes, only sometimes, his temper takes him over, and he'll never let it happen again. He would never, _ever_  let it happen again. He would call her baby and cradle her as if she were one. Of course, every word he spoke would be a lie, but at least she could lose herself in the lies for a few minutes. It would have been better, she figured, if he had at least pretended to be sorry.

Blood in the urine. She'd been on her period but hadn't wanted to say so. The kind doctor in Belfast was clearly not the type to be uncomfortable with such matters, but she wanted such things to be private, like what she had eaten for dinner the night beforehand, like why they could see a single wisdom tooth in her x-rays. Though she thought the question stupid, she wanted to ask it anyway: will my period make this misleading? While she had been in hospital with Jo, she'd had an M.R.I. done with contrast, the liquid making her feel so cold that she shook. She hadn't wanted another scan like that just because her period had been misleading.

When she had her first period, she hadn't known such a thing existed. Had Daddy been home, she would've gone to him, but he hadn't been, the two parents out of town on some jaunt; only Bedelia and the nannies were home, so she asked Bedelia. _I think I've hurt myself,_  Stella had said, explaining the situation to an utterly uninterested Bedelia who just wanted to keep packing for school in America, someplace she was excited to see. Instead, Bedelia ended up pulling books from the shelves in Daddy's study, some impartial anatomy books and one guide to medical illustration. Sitting on the bathroom floor together, they pored through each book, Bedelia pointing to the proper diagrams and explaining the nature of menstruation in an objective, scientific way. On Stella's bedroom calendar - one with horse pictures, Stella could remember it so clearly - Bedelia drew proper diagrams, writing in _ovulation days_  even though Stella didn't understand what those were. 

"I thought it was much worse," Stella gave. 

With a furrowed brow, Bedelia asked, "Like what?"

Back then, Bedelia used to wear her hair in a braid a little ribbon tied at the bottom. One of the girls at the stables used to wear her hair like that too, though long before Bedelia did. Every time Stella and Bedelia went riding, Bedelia would always ask the stables' staff about that girl, whether or not she was riding today, and on the off-chance that they all could ride together, Bedelia would ignore Stella the whole time, talking only to the girl, trying to make her laugh. _Edith,_  that was her name, Edie for short. Stella had never seen her sister try to make someone laugh before.

"Like I was dying," Stella said. "Like I would bleed out."

Bedelia scoffed, "It's never much blood. Most of it is mucus or remnants of uterine lining."

"Yeah, but I was still scared."

Bedelia shook her head and gave a little smirk. _Oh, silly girl._

"If you die," Bedelia had left with, letting Stella face new womanhood alone, "it will be my fault."

On the other side of the bed, Bedelia was silent, no longer shifting and shaking. Maybe she had managed to fall asleep. Pulling the covers back over her shoulders, Stella nestled down, tried to manage some sleep as well. 

* * *

Stella woke in the early hours of the morning, looked to her clock to find that it was still on London time, scoffed and put her head back down. With the jet lag catching up to her, she knew it was poorly optimistic to think she would fall asleep again, but there was something uncouth about getting up, about being awake in Bedelia's home at what must be four in the morning. On the night beforehand, Stella had found their mother's journals, documentation of something Stella didn't want to think about, so what would she find tonight? This place was bound to have ghosts, but then again, how could anyone have died here, in such a modern place? Stella had no desire to sit in the kitchen and look out at the stained living room carpet, at where her sister counseled the mentally ill. Now, there was no need to be there, around the alcohol and the blood, around everything she'd chosen in light of better things. 

She'd been set up to fail, but that didn't mean her actions weren't still her fault. When she felt cornered like that, she usually at least knew better, but in this different country, around these people she didn't understand, using a greenish currency that felt wrong in her hands, she hadn't been able to _know better._  In retrospect, she knew that there was a pool here, that she could've just gone for a fucking swim, but last night, she couldn't see such opportunities, could only see what was directly in front of her: hunger, anger, loneliness, and tiredness. Every twelve-step program told members to be diligent about those specific feelings, to attend to them immediately because not doing so would lead to slip-ups. The last time she bought blades, she had been a decade younger. At first, the specific last date had been something she kept in mind, but now, she couldn't recall it, not at all; nonetheless, she would remember this time around, the same date as the one on her mother's tombstone. 

She should have predicted that this would happen. She shouldn't have asked Bedelia for money. She should have just gone for a swim. She should have stayed in London. Whatever the proper course was, she knew from the throbbing in her leg that she'd gone in the opposite direction, taking the road traveled by the fuck-ups who died early. At nineteen years old, she'd known that she would be lucky to live past twenty-five, but now, she could look at herself, mid-forties and in better shape than most people her age, and call life negligible. How had she gotten so off-track? Since when had she been all about subsistence to the point that one troublesome trip led to multiple varieties of relapse? Shouldn't something have made this transition easier?

But she'd hurt herself, voluntarily, multiple times. Here, she couldn't duck into her home and let the harm she did stay within a confined space; if she didn't turn up for dinner, her sister would come looking, and the hurt would spread. As she'd watched Bedelia take off her bloodied gloves, as she'd seen Bedelia's sigh of remorse, fear, relief, she knew that there was something violent about what she had just done, envisioned a matching mark forming on Bedelia's leg in the same place. She hadn't realized she was capable of causing her sister pain, but she wished she'd known and had thought better of the action, had locked the bathroom door and been better about controlling the bleeding, had actually managed the whole thing as she had intended to. If she'd known that Bedelia could be scared, she wouldn't have done it. If she'd known that Bedelia could be hurt, she wouldn't have done it. 

To Stella, Bedelia had always been more of a concept than a person, a distant sister whose life was about swimming or medicine or psychiatry, whichever topic was more pertinent. Stella knew her sister as only someone who would leave home at fourteen without batting an eyelash but cry hysterically in a horse stable and be inconsolable for a whole week. No matter how many times Stella tried to puzzle through her sister, she could never understand Bedelia, could never see why Bedelia would choose such an odd form of medicine to practice, could never figure out the allure of the United States and how it had managed to keep Bedelia for so long. Now, Stella could see that what she'd never known in Bedelia, what had grown convoluted and uneasy between them, was love. Bedelia was intensely, horrifically capable of love. If Bedelia loved her, Stella knew that no harm would ever befall her, that Bedelia would protect her at all costs, but Stella could see a fear in her sister as well, a sense that the love she gave could only hurt her. _I know the feeling,_  Stella thought, thinking of how Reed hadn't called tonight. _I know the feeling all too well._

Glancing behind herself, Stella cringed at the sight of an empty bed, Bedelia's side of the linens folded back. When Stella touched the sheets there, she found them cold, Bedelia having left the room long ago. With the bathroom lights off, the room feeling still, she knew her sister wasn't here, but where did that mean she could have gone? There was no mother to see in the hospital, no other place to be. Bedelia had said she didn't want Stella out of her sight, but now, Stella was out of her sight. Though Stella knew that should excite her, that she should feel giddy enough to go into the kitchen, find the sharpest knife, and use it to do what Bedelia forbade, she didn't want that at all. Standing slowly, she mentally mapped the house, tried to figure out where to check first. From the bedroom, she went first past where Bedelia took patients - no luck - then followed through to the kitchen, which was dark and empty, save for the two ramen bowls left in the sink. When she came to the sitting room outside of the kitchen, just two couches and long picture windows in the proper rich woman's fashion, she staggered to a stop, stared out at the rising summer sun beyond the windows, saw the slightest bit of light cast on her sister's face as she awkwardly slept there with a man, the same man from the night before. Though he still wore a nice suit, he'd shed the jacket, had undone the first few buttons of his shirt. Bedelia still wore her slip, this time covered with her silk robe.

Stella felt as if she were trespassing, seeing them wrapped up together on a couch, their legs outstretched on an ottoman, her hip against the cushions as she brought her arms around his body. She leaned her head on his shoulder, his own head leaning on top of hers. Stella could tell that they hadn't intended to fall asleep like this, that the monogrammed handkerchief - not Bedelia's - left on the couch cushions had had a purpose, and of course, Stella knew better than to think that her sister would present herself like this in front of another person unless something drastic had happened. A late night call, Stella supposed, and they'd lost track of time, or they'd had no concept of time, or they'd nodded off expectantly, knowing that the profound difference between a sitting room's couch and Bedelia's bedroom was a difference worth respecting. 

Stella didn't think that Bedelia cuddled. She didn't think that Bedelia was the type to have a boyfriend, or to have someone whose supposed title could potentially be _boyfriend_  and not something clearer and more astute. Though she knew that Bedelia had been hurt, that Bedelia had felt the impact of the last few days, she found herself uneasy with the concept of how even Bedelia could ask for help. Maybe it had been a leap of faith, or maybe Bedelia had done this countless times before, but nonetheless, Bedelia had asked for comfort. The last time Stella had done that, Jo had been alive, and it had been decades since Jo had been alive.

Gingerly, Stella moved back toward the kitchen, walked past the stained carpet, took the bedroom's steps slowly in hope that she wouldn't hit any loud or wakeful boards. In Bedelia's bedroom, Stella found her cell phone, right next to the incorrect clock and unused journal, and checked the hour, did the mental math, counted each timezone. Four in the morning outside of Baltimore was nine in the morning in Belfast. If she was lucky, if the stars aligned, she might catch Reed before work, or maybe she could leave a message instead, a bit more impersonal but a better kind of invitation. Then, the decision would be in Reed's hands; if Reed wanted to continue speaking, all she needed to do was call, but it was ultimately her choice to call, not Stella's. Stella dialed the number, waited as the phone rang, heard the telltale message that meant Reed wouldn't be picking up, be it because of the hour or because she had seen Stella's contact and had chosen not to pick up.

After the beep, Stella took a deep breath, tried to think of what to say. Maybe she should have waited a moment, planned out a proper apology, made sure she hit every proper point and gave Reed some reason for hope, but she was on the line now, and she didn't know what to say but had to think of something.

"Hey," Stella managed. 

She took a deep breath, felt sweat forming on her brow, didn't know where to go from here. If she hung up and tried again, that would look suspicious, so she needed to think of _something,_  but what could she say? That she didn't want to hurt herself anymore? That she'd been wrong to hold back information, even if she'd thought it was of vital importance for her to do so at the time? She didn't want to make excuses; she wanted to say that she'd been wrong, and that she may continue to be wrong, but that, if Reed would let her, she wanted to do better. Though Stella didn't quite know how to be better, she wanted Reed to know that she _wanted_  to be better, that she would make whatever effort she could, that she wouldn't hold things back anymore, wouldn't lie because she was too scared to admit the truth. _I was wrong to take you for granted,_  Stella wished to say, _and I've never felt that more acutely than now. Each evening, I couldn't wait to hear from you again, but I never said that to you. I would brush it off, deny what I was feeling, cover it up in whatever way I could, but the reality is that I care so deeply for you. When I get off track at work, I think about you. I think about you and your husband and your daughters, and I think about your mind, and how you speak, and the way that you laugh. You opened yourself to me, and in return, I lied. I should never have lied. I'm so sorry._  But she couldn't say that, could she?

Suddenly, the line ended, and as Stella looked down at her phone, she saw an incoming call from Reed, an interruption. With a shaking hand, she tried to decide whether or not to accept the call.

 _If your sister, of all people, can ask for help,_  Stella thought, _then you can be vulnerable for one fucking phone call._

So she answered.


	20. Interlude: Every Little Thing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologize for the ridiculous length of time between updates. My health has not been good. Hopefully, the update schedule will normalize within the coming weeks.
> 
> Months ago, I wrote [a followup to the final scene in the previous chapter](http://alicecomfort.tumblr.com/post/177009782632/first-time-heshe-comforted-himher-msr) on my blog. Though I don't intend to include this scene in the document here, I will keep it linked in case anyone would like to read it.

Taking the tube home from class, Stella put a Janis Joplin tape into Jo's Walkman, skipped through the first few songs. It had been a challenge from her therapist, the music on public transportation: stop jumping at every single sound by trying to tune everything else out. The first time, it had been nearly impossible, her headphones coming off every few seconds, eyes darting around while other passengers looked at her strangely, but today, she knew she could keep them on the whole time, or if she couldn't, then she would take the tube all the way back to campus, and she would start over. At first, she'd felt progress as pain, as waking only once during the night, as a lessened horror that was still horror nonetheless, but now, she could ride the tube without jumping, and she had a chance to tangibly prove that to herself. After weeks of minute progress, she could listen to music on the way home from class. That was something.

The doors opened and closed; people got on and off; she kept listening to the tape, looking around herself with a casual awareness, her hands shaking at points but not in ways that she couldn't simply breathe through. By the time she walked into their apartment building, she found herself almost bouncing with each step, taking the stairs in twos. Therapy hadn't felt like progress; instead, it had felt like a foot-dragging obligation, something to tell Jo was going great and something that would maybe, someday, if all of the stars aligned, bring about the undefined buzzword that was _healing._  According to Stella's therapist, trauma was not heavily researched, so their work was guess-and-check, a _let's see_  in between appointments, and finally, _finally,_  something was sticking. Stella's hands didn't even shake as she put her key into the flat's lock. When she opened the door, she was nearly bursting with excitement, hoping to see Jo having an afternoon cuppa at the kitchen table, hoping to detail how somehow, miraculously, everything was okay.

But Jo wasn't alone at the kitchen table, and there certainly wasn't any tea. The second woman - dark-haired and tired-looking, wearing a heather-grey turtleneck and a furrow between her brows - was unfamiliar to Stella but clearly familiar to Jo based on how Jo's hand came over this woman's on the table, a consoling gesture, a reaching-out. When the woman looked up to see Stella, she jerked her hand away from Jo, looked distraught.

"Are you fucking kidding?" she said to Jo, aggravation clear. Whatever Stella had walked in on, it had been delicate, and now, it was ruined. "I'm gone for, what, a few months, and you find _this?_  Is she even of age, Joan?"

As Jo went to speak, this woman stood and shut her down, saying, " _Save it._ "

In seconds, the woman was gathering up her coat from the back of her chair, pulling it over her arms, forcing past Stella as she practically stomped out of the flat. Though the woman who left was clearly angry, Stella could see that Jo seemed only shaken and sad, her face an uncomfortable kind of blank, eyes weary. She was still in her work clothes, a silk shirt and trousers, something that was permissible as the weather grew warmer. No sweater, not anymore. Still, Stella would borrow her sweaters, for her lecture buildings were chilly, and she liked the way it felt to wear someone else's clothing, how the smell was different, unmistakably human, recognizable but impossible to replicate.

They were silent for a few beats, the sound of the woman's footsteps disappearing, the flat tense and stale. Looking for something to say, Stella felt the weight of Jo's Walkman and her keys in her hands, forced out without thinking, "I managed the whole tube today."

Shaken from her thoughts, Jo glanced up at Stella, the room still uncomfortable, Stella's cheeks flushing with embarrassment. _Not the right time to say that._  But luckily, Jo's lips curved into a little smile, her face softening, her posture relaxing. With slow movements, Jo stood, her bare feet making her seem closer to Stella's height, her steps toward Stella making Stella relax too. When Jo reached out and wrapped her arms around the shorter girl, Stella closed her eyes in relief, glad that whatever that woman had said could dissipate, glad that things could still be right. 

Jo was holding her especially tight, especially desperately. 

"You don't know how much I needed to hear that," Jo whispered to Stella on an exhale. "Thank you."

* * *

As Stella brushed her teeth that night, Jo was still at the kitchen table, her glasses on and papers that she would cover up when Stella walked by sitting in front of her. Assets, or something along those lines. Stella was unsure which Jo felt more like hiding, the relationship itself or just the depth of it. The bed that Stella had slept in for weeks, months now, had been shared by two women, two women who loved, and for long enough that Jo's brow furrowed while she looked over bank statements, called a lawyer in hope of updating her living will, spoke in hushed tones as if all of this still needed to be a secret. Given the timeframe, the separation must have begun before Stella met Jo, but still, there was something haunting about how solitary Jo's home had seemed the first time Stella stepped into it, no framed pictures, nothing but detached art on the walls. Few V.H.S. tapes, a blanket but only one hung on the back of the couch, the fridge a celibate kind of sparse intended for one woman, no unexplained containers left about. It had been almost a revelation to see Jo's toothbrush on a holder in the bathroom, her toothpaste tube left open, disorder atop spotless white porcelain. Now, Stella's toothbrush was next to Jo's, and Jo kept her face cream - or, rather, the face cream they shared - on the sink too, proof that people lived here, proof that this wasn't a lonely place. They'd even hung pictures on the fridge, film camera shots done by friends of Jo's, the four of them walking through the park on a sunny early-spring day, Jo and Stella pictured together and both wearing Jo's coats. When Stella had let go of Jo after coming in at the wrong time, she'd looked to the fridge and seen that those pictures weren't up anymore. 

She spat, washed her face, retreated to the bedroom. Jo wasn't in just yet, but Stella was tired, so she went into the white, clean dresser, pulled a pair of folded pajama pants that weren't her own from the drawers, dressed in springtime cotton. Now, the flannel sheets were off of the bed, lighter ones left in their wake, and as Stella pulled back the dark comforter, she liked the change of the seasons, how winter was finally over and how she now could work her way into having the proper money for a proper springtime raincoat, given that Jo only owned one and therefore couldn't lend Stella a spare. With therapy going well, Stella had had the idea of a job proposed to her, a job based in tutoring students in lower-level anthropology before their examinations having come up since then; she could start making her own money, no longer feeling guilty when she couldn't offer money that Jo would never take for rent. She could be independent in time, genuinely independent, given that she could stay here, given that she was still wanted. Now, there was plenty of visible progress, even more than just being able to listen to a whole tape on the train. She was getting better. She was going to be okay.

But she hoped she wouldn't have to leave here for a while. She liked living with Jo, liked coming home from late nights spent studying to find Jo still awake, liked how Jo would kiss her goodbye on the top of the head before leaving for early-morning shifts while Stella slept to a more reasonable time. Especially, Stella liked the bedroom they shared, the queen-sized bed being the central element, the wide, long windows looking out at the rest of London. It wasn't high-end real estate, but Stella liked the beauty of the buildings, the simplicity of where they lived; she liked that the flat wasn't too noisy, that their home was small enough to be cozy but not so small that it felt cramped. She liked that her own bedside table was shoved in between the bed and the window-side wall, barely fitting in the tight quarters. She liked how Jo had gotten an extra mirror to put atop the dresser, had moved her lipsticks and blushes so that Stella could fit her own things there. She liked that there was a combination of sophistication and ease, how they both insisted on elegance but opted for bare-minimum accommodations. When they went out, they wore silk shirts, and when they stayed in, they used dishes with chips at the rims. Stella liked that they kept good tea exclusively for special occasions. She liked that _special occasions_  existed beyond just Christmas and Easter. She liked that special occasions existed at all. 

As Stella went to turn out the lamp on her bedside table, she heard the bathroom sink turn on, so she stilled, kept the light on. If Jo would be in in a few minutes, Stella might as well stay awake, so Stella leaned back, picked up her book from the bedside table, tried to occupy herself. Something Camus, something existential and serious. Furrowing her brow, she set the book down, stood, went into the closet in hope of finding a different book. Last month, she read something lighthearted, something so frivolous that Jo wouldn't even keep it shelved in the living room, so Stella looked in that same spot again, needed some kind of stupid romance, something that overlooked the quintessential parts of life about which Camus would only make her upset. Next to the shoe boxes, there was a stack of books, and as Stella stood on tiptoe to find them, she could just barely read the titles. A simple romance, all she needed was a simple romance, but as she looked over the titles, she felt her face fade. 

_The Trauma of Girls: A Psychological Perspective_

_Healing Childhood Sexual Abuse_

_It Was Never My Fault: Physical Abuse & The Brain_

The paperbacks had been cracked, worn-in, perhaps bought used but seeming in too good condition to have been used for long. These books hadn't been there months beforehand. Quickly, Stella closed the closet, went back to bed, picked up the Camus, tried to read it again, but she couldn't distract herself from the titles, the shocking impact of them, the strangeness of having such things written so close by. Given the placement of the books, they'd been just out of Stella's line of sight, just out of reach, but Jo would've seen them every day, every time she went into the closet. Stella didn't know what to make of the finding.

When Jo came into the bedroom, went to the drawers, found pajamas, Stella didn't know what to do, what to say, so she stared down at the book as Jo dressed, tried and failed to read what was on the current page.

"Do you want to know?" Jo asked as she shimmied into new clothes, then looked back at Stella.

Jo's hair had grown frizzy in the time between washes. On Saturday nights, they liked to do that together, to put hot oils in their hair and watch television while the treatment set. A rest day, Jo liked to call the interim. Stella liked how Jo's typically-styled locks grew more voluminous in between washes, less contained. 

Looking up from her book, Stella met Jo's gaze, gave, "Yes, I would."

Jo took a deep breath as she walked toward the bed, as she found her way onto her side, as she went beneath the covers and retired for the day. Letting out a long exhale, Jo looked every bit as tired as she was acting, bags forming under her eyes, the hours of work on dividing whatever assets she'd been dividing having clearly taken a toll. 

"I'm not sure if I should've told you earlier or not," Jo said, looking to Stella with an almost-apology in her eyes. "I didn't think it would come up. It wasn't...it's not something I'm particularly proud of."

Furrowing her brow, Stella looked down at Jo, asked, "Proud of what?"

Jo closed her eyes, too exhausted for the explanation despite its simplicity.

"She was my partner," Jo explained. "Rachael. My...we were together for a long time."

 _Oh,_  Stella thought, not able to put an emotion to the word. 

"It wasn't legal, obviously," Jo gave, and from the way she crossed her arms over her chest, the way she sunk into the bed, Stella could tell that she was uncomfortable, that this wasn't a topic she wanted to speak about. "The logistics were complicated. This place was in her name, even. It's just...you never think that you're going to have to worry about those things. If everything is good, you're really not supposed to."

Stella set down the book, not even bothering to mark her page, and leaned back in bed so that they were at the same level. Turning onto her side, Stella faced Jo, watched the way Jo swallowed in soft lamplight, the remainder of their part of the city steadily going to bed as time went on. There was something so alluring about the intimacy of the bed, about how they both had their own ways of coping with the day-to-day ritual of sleep. On her bedside table, Jo kept a glass of water, a clock that she could dim, a lamp, a piece of torn-out notebook paper and a pen for when her thoughts turned cyclical and wouldn't let her tune out for the night; Stella could be close to Jo like this, could see Jo without makeup and without walls, could speak to her in secret tones that only their part of the world would hear. And, of course, she loved nothing more than being able to wake up next to someone else, to come out of a nightmare knowing she was safe, to wake to someone kissing her head and saying _I'll see you after work._  Even though she could see the strange, judgmental looks from Jo's friends whenever they were together, Stella knew that this was right, at least right for her. Though Jo always emphasized how welcome Stella was, Stella still hadn't the slightest idea if Jo minded the lack of rent money, the borrowed clothes.

"So, either way," Jo continued, "she brought over a list of what she wanted. We can't exactly use lawyers. When she asked for certain things, I got upset, so she got upset, and it just spiraled. She didn't know who you were, so she assumed what wasn't the truth. None of that was your fault, Stella. It didn't have anything to do with you."

Thinking of the closet again, Stella remembered the books, the _it's not your fault._  In many cases, it wasn't her fault, but she still hated the feeling anyway, one of knowing that her existence caused others harm. If she let herself think too much about the topic, she ended up wishing she were dead. 

"When she comes back," Jo finalized, "I'll make sure she knows the truth. And, of course, I'll make sure that she comes by while you're in class."

Stella nodded, taking the information in. Though she knew that there was more to Jo than just Jo's outward appearance, she still felt uncomfortable learning that there had been a large part of this woman's life that Stella had never encountered. However, as she looked to Jo, she saw the newness of this absence, the sense that the apartment shouldn't have been empty when Stella moved in. She could understand the omission. 

"I should've told you, I think," Jo said, nodding against her pillow, looking to Stella. "I'm sorry that I didn't. I just...it wasn't the proper time at any time. I didn't want you to feel as if you couldn't lean on me or as if you should hold back. I didn't want you to think I was...."

Shaking her head, Jo let her gaze go down, didn't finish the sentence. Stella moved closer to her in bed, came onto Jo's pillow, wrapped an arm around Jo's stomach. With Jo's hand coming to the back of her head, Stella relaxed there, let Jo kiss the top of her head in that sloppy, aimless way that Stella so liked. 

"Can you tell me about her?" Stella asked.

She felt as if they were talking in codes, a big secret left between them, a _this doesn't leave the room_  agreement made between them, but at the same time, it felt strangely natural to ask this woman about her lover, her wife. Though Stella had wondered about such a concept, had seen it in other cultures and in movies but never up-close, she hadn't thought such a thing would be so accessible, that such people could pass her every day on the street, that she could possibly live with someone gay. Somehow, the knowledge felt like relief.

Voice soft, tired, Jo asked, "What would you like to know?"

"How long were you together?"

"Fifteen years," Jo gave. "No, sixteen. Well, if you say we separated months ago, it would be fifteen, but had we made it a bit past then, it would've been sixteen."

Stella stilled, the number staggering. More than a decade, nearly two? She couldn't imagine being with someone that long, loving someone for such a period of time. She couldn't imagine having to pretend that such a partnership didn't exist all the while. She couldn't imagine not marrying such a person.

"What was she like while you were together?" Stella asked.

In therapy, it was supposedly healthy to simply talk about things, to air out grievances and let memories become osmotic, spread out, less overwhelming in their concentration. Beneath Stella's curiosity was a want for Jo to relax, to calm down from the day, to go to bed knowing that she was still loved despite all that had happened. Because Jo would have done the same for Stella, had done so plenty of times before, Stella felt a duty toward this woman, toward making her feel better. She couldn't just let such a topic go.

Taking a deep breath, Jo gave, "Sweet. Special, I think. I'm not even sure how I would describe it."

"What makes you say that?"

"She just...we just had a lot in common," Jo said. "And it was just friendship for a while, but then, things started to get different, and I was in denial of it for such a long time. I thought that...I figured, maybe it was one-sided. When we first met, she'd had a boyfriend, so I thought I might just be someone to rebound with, a way of being happy with being single, but we ended up together anyway. It took emotional effort, but it was so worth it. She just...made things easier. I don't know how to describe it. Having a picture of her on my desk at work, living with her...it felt as if I always had some reason to smile, even when things were at their worst. I always had someone to do things with. Even when I felt my most alone, I wasn't really alone at all.

"But I think...she had been looking for something different from me, and we never quite communicated that. I think she wanted more of me than what I could give her. And that's not her fault, and it's not mine either. We just had such different expectations. At first, it was okay that we weren't like friends of ours. We didn't have the same privileges as they did, so when they were married, had children, it made sense as to why Rachael and I were living a different sort of life. She did grow frustrated with it all eventually, so we tried what we could, looking into domestic partnership, trying to find a different way, but it was so costly, so troublesome. People at work had always thought she was my sister. It's hard to transition from a lie to the truth. Though we had no choice in whether or not we told the truth originally, we still felt the consequences of such a thing, and while she tried to push back against those consequences, I didn't. 

"And then, she wanted children. She was getting older, and she knew that this was a very now-or-never kind of situation, so we tried to find a way. It got harder and harder despite how little progress we made in the process, and eventually, it became clear that she was more invested than I was. She was so upset with me, saying I'd strung her along, and she said she needed some time to think things over, to see how what our future would be. And she wanted that time without me."

Jo swallowed, the muscles of her neck moving slowly, the movement catching Stella's gaze. 

"You could have had my baby," Stella gave, voice quiet. 

Jo's eyes shut quickly, her body tensing. 

"Stella-"

"I wouldn't have wanted it, but I never wanted it to die," Stella gave. "Well, I...I did want it to die, but not like that. I didn't want to have to kill it myself. I wouldn't have been able to, not like that, not even if I knew I would die unless I killed it. And I wanted someone like you to have it."

Pulling Stella closer to her, Jo kept her palm on the back of Stella's head, brought Stella's face close to her own so that Stella's face was crowded with darkness, so that one sense stopped overwhelming her. 

"It's alright," Jo said, voice soft. "Some things just aren't meant to be. It's painful, but someday, we may see that we're stronger because of them. We would never wish them upon anyone else, not ever, but we know we're resilient because we survived."

Jo stroked her fingers through Stella's hair, was so gentle. Stella couldn't understand why someone would leave this woman, why anyone would be upset with her. Stella wanted to spit in Rachael's face and say she was a liar, a bitch. 

"After Rachael left, you came into my life," Jo said, body warm against Stella's, comforting. "For once, I was available at a strange hour to go to a strange place. Had she and I still been together, I would've never found you. You've been the greatest blessing in the aftermath. When I had to leave you at the hospital, when I couldn't serve you any longer, I'd felt so torn, so unsure. I knew you needed me, but I didn't know how to express that, how to show you such a thing without being overbearing, either legally or personally. And finding you after you called, I...."

Jo trailed off, huffed an uncomfortable breath, tried to continue.

"I'm so thankful that you came to stay," Jo said. "You made me do better by myself and others. Before then, all I did was mope, complain, stay in. I wasn't doing anything worth doing while I kept telling myself that I was someone meant to help others. And in the end, I didn't even help you; all I did was give you some tools. And watching you bloom has been a most beautiful experience. Every time you come home excited about something, I can't stop thinking about how much work you've done. I can't stop thinking about how you've become so sharp, so educated. I know it's been hard, but you've met every single challenge and triumphed. You've made me want to do better. I'm so lucky to know you at all."

 _No,_  Stella wanted to say, _I'm the lucky one. I don't know where I would be without you. You saved me. I swear, you saved me. How can you think otherwise?_

"I hope what she said didn't insult you," Jo gave awkwardly, trying to close the conversation. "I don't think of you in that way, not at all. I would hate for you to think something like that was true."

"I know," Stella said, feeling off-kilter but safe, taking a breath to center herself. "I know it came from a place of pain. Hers, not my own."

"Yes," Jo said, the word implying finality. "And you received grades today, didn't you? How's everything going?"

Leaning back, glad for a change in topic, Stella said, "Fantastic, actually. For the classes I missed, we worked out some new due dates for assignments, so now, I'm doing fine. Better than fine, really. I'm doing well enough that they want me to tutor first-years."

Jo's face lit up, eyes wide with excitement. "That's fantastic."

"Yes," Stella gave, smiling awkwardly, "I'm glad about it." 

"What if we take a trip to Oxford?" Jo asked, voice quiet as if she were telling a secret. "Tomorrow. Saturday morning, you and me. We can see where you're going to end up."

" _No,_ " Stella gave, "I'll never get into  _Oxford._ "

"You can't possibly know that," Jo said. "And it'll just be to look. You know, inspect the campus. Deem whether or not those students are up to your caliber."

Laughing, Stella said, " _Stop._ "

"See the castle, the museums," Jo listed wistfully. "The botanic gardens...."

Stella hadn't been to Oxford in a long time, not since she was little and had gone with Daddy. Together, they had seen the university, had marveled at how someplace so old could still be in such beautiful condition, had seen the castle and had crowned her princess of it. She liked old things, the ones that stuck together, the ones that survived. She liked that she could see the histories of people she would never meet, could feel their impact even if their lives were so far from hers.

"Would we take the train?" Stella asked, playing into the imagining. 

"Yes," Jo said, and they really would end up taking the train, sitting together for the hour-and-a-half ride, each reading their respective books and pointing out bits of fine scenery. Stella liked the window seats while Jo liked the aisle, so they were the perfect match, one opting for a bigger bag while the other took a smaller one and then swapping bags whenever someone wanted less to carry, snacks and reading material brought along for the day trip. Jo liked a cup of tea as a break from sightseeing, so they would duck into a cafe, split a chocolate croissant because they weren't the kind of boring women to go for a plain one because the chocolate was _too sweet._  If they found a good bookstore, they would pop in, picking up whatever piqued their interest as entertainment for the way home. Stella would take Jo's coat midway through the day because Jo always got too warm while Stella always ended up too cold. On the campus, they would sit together, and they would admire the sights, talk about the future, talk about how Stella was fairly sure she wanted to stay in academia, talk about what the rest of the year would mean for them.

 _I'm so lucky to have you,_  Jo would say as they sat among beautiful buildings. _I'm so lucky that I can spend this time with you. Yesterday, I was...seeing Rachael hurts now, though I know it shouldn't. I miss her in an indescribable way, like a scab you used to like to pick. I loved her. Stella, I can't...I would never be able to describe to you how much I loved her. We were together for so long, and in the end, it felt as if I didn't know what a life was like without her, but still, life is so similar. It's being with people you love, seeing beautiful things. It's trying to do the best you can with what little time you have. And, my goodness, it's so selfish. It's so unbelievably selfish, but I wouldn't do anything differently, not ever. Not ever._

"Then I'll need to bring something better than Camus," Stella joked.

Laughing, Jo shook her head, said, "I'm sure we can find you something."

They fell asleep in the same way that they would on the train home the next day, bodies canted toward each other and just barely touching.


	21. Interlude: Redshirt

Shoving her braids into her swim cap, Bedelia took a deep breath, white-knuckling for yet another meet. If she so much as moved her left arm, her shoulder would send pinching or shooting pains, the sensation differing depending on the angle of motion. Last night, Mathilde had tried to massage it for her, leaving Bedelia face-down and in only her brassiere on her dormitory's bed; Mathilde had pulled apart the clasps, let Bedelia's back go bare, and with a handful of lotion in one hand rubbed around where it hurt most. Though Bedelia couldn't feel any lasting effect of the massage, she kept thinking of it over and over again, the feeling of Mathilde's fingers against her skin on her mind throughout the whole bus ride here. This morning, she'd wanted to ask Mathilde if she could do braids for a swim meet, but of course, Mathilde was most likely hungover somewhere, smoking a cigarette where she shouldn't have been, doing whatever it is French girls think they can do in America. Mathilde wasn't someone to do braids before sporting events.

"Okay." From behind, Margaret tapped Bedelia's shoulder - the right one, the good one - twice. The pool area was tiled and stark, yellowing around the edges; the place seemed inhuman and artificial, the scent of chlorine strong enough that Bedelia's skin already felt dry. "We're just barely able to get to regionals, and if you go out strong, we might really have a shot. I need you to give it your all today."

"Yeah," Bedelia gave, knowing she couldn't, not with the way her shoulder hurt, not with how on-edge she felt whenever Margaret touched her now.

"I mean it," Margaret emphasized. She smelled too much like lavender soap, as if she were overcompensating. "The whole team's relying on you."

Yes, the whole team that still wouldn't talk to her was relying on _her_ , the junior whose presence on varsity made everyone uncomfortable. Even Cassie looked at her with an anxious discomfort now, friendliness gone. Just last week, Bedelia had been doing an extra training run, a way to keep herself limber, and as she'd taken the route by the nearest pizza shop to campus, she'd looked through the frosted-over windows and seen all of the girls from the team getting three large pies together, laughing and not wearing sports clothes, taking pictures on a film camera as if dinner were an event worth documenting. As Bedelia turned a corner, headed for the woodland trail she liked to follow, she'd thought of how the girls had been whispering to each other at practice, how Bedelia would hear soft voices followed by _yeah, totally_  or something equally affirmative, and she'd known with full confidence that these girls had voluntarily left her out, had specifically made sure she wouldn't know to be there. Pushing her pace, trying to quell her discomfort, she'd thought about turning back, about stopping in for a soda and saying _oh, hey, didn't realize you guys would be here_  and sitting down as if she'd been invited, but that felt like such a small thing to do, an idiotic thing. She didn't even like these girls, yet she wanted them to like her, to think she was interesting, to ask her questions and genuinely want to hear her answers. But instead, they didn't invite her for pizza. When she'd headed back toward the school, she'd passed the window again, and they had still been inside, the pizzas picked over, everyone growing tired and ready to head back to campus for the day. Despite the protests from her legs, she'd sped up in hope that, by the time the girls returned to campus, she would already be in her room for the night, showered and ready to sleep, no need to interact with anyone else for the rest of the day.

So. The whole team was relying on her. If they didn't make it to regionals, she would be at fault. If they did make it to regionals, she would have to travel with the whole team - and Margaret, of course - to some shitty part of New England or the surrounding states so that she could, once again, try to be the poster child that Margaret wanted her to be. She wasn't even sure that she liked swimming anymore, the practices making her hands shake with fear, each day spent showering among girls who would laugh at her expense feeling like an assault. She didn't like having to be anywhere near Margaret, who would now corner her in hallways, insist on asking how she was doing, push and pester because Bedelia was being _abnormally distant._  As she pulled on her goggles, Bedelia just wanted to be alone.

She made her mark. She took to the diving platform with ease. Even when her shoulder pinched at the feeling of getting into position, she took position anyway. The team, her good-for-nothing, shit-for-brains, Mercedes-driving, beach-housed team that couldn't even invite her for pizza, was counting on her, and she would deliver, for if she didn't have them, then she had nothing. If she didn't swim, she would have nothing. Margaret had told her plenty of times before that her grades weren't good enough for much of any university, not with her learning disability, not with how she always felt two steps behind the other students; if she didn't swim, then these would be her circumstances for good, the same ones she would face in college, the same ones she would have after that. This was the one thing she was good at, and today, she would be not good but _great,_  the swimmer who brought their team to regionals. Today, she would win.

The starting sound echoed off of the tiled walls; Bedelia dove as the other girls did; she set off with an intense kick, something that would make her knees ache tomorrow, and despite the burning pains in her shoulder, the sensations that made her breathing inconsistent, she pushed anyway, insistent on finishing this race, insistent on winning again. She could have another breakout race. She could be in the papers again, even if they were only local ones. When people thought of her, they thought of swimming, and for good reason; she was the best of the best, the one who won races, the one who would go to college for this and be at the top of her game because of it. Eventually, she leaned more into her good shoulder, and as she did so, she tried to steady her breathing, make her pace more consistent. Though she wouldn't be swimming well, she would still be swimming. If enough of the other girls had gone out cautiously, then she could still manage second. She could still get them to regionals.

At the flip turn, her shoulder grew limp, so she took a moment to breathe, but when she lifted her head from the water, she didn't see other swimmers coming in; no, she saw everyone a quarter of a pool length away from her. She was the deadweight, the lag. _Don't freeze,_  she insisted, pushing herself again, but it was no use, not with how far ahead the other girls were, not with how every motion hurt. But she tried to salvage it, pushed herself on even as she flapped at the water, causing splashes, going nowhere. At half of the pool's length, her shoulder gave way, and she couldn't move it, not even with force, and in a panic she gulped in a breath, let herself fall face-down into the water, floating like a dead man. At the bottom were little blue tiles, dark and made to mark lane areas and the start of flip-turns; with water in her ears, she could barely hear the cheering around the pool, the screaming coaches, Margaret telling her to _fucking do something already._  Without thinking, she let her breath out through her nose, sunk to the bottom slowly. Twisting at the stomach, she flipped herself without jostling her shoulder, and from this angle, she could look up and see the serene emptiness of a world above a pool, could hear nothing but the sound of her own pounding heart. She closed her eyes for a moment, let her arms go weightless and float up slightly, her heels naturally lifting. For a moment, a song from her father's study came to mind, the version of "Clair de Lune" that was on his most worn-out record, the vinyl crackling and skipping at parts. She could remember standing outside the door and listening in, as if she were a spy. On one of the tapes Margaret had given her, there was a version of the song. _I should show Mathilde,_  she thought, feeling blissfully weightless. _I think she would like it._

But she forced her eyes open when the pounding of swimmers came by, everyone else completing another lap around her. She would never catch up, and suddenly, her anxiety returned, and she couldn't hear the music anymore, or feel weightless, or move herself away from here. And she needed to breathe, _fuck,_  she needed to _breathe,_  and the other girls were going to be turning soon, and she was done for, she wasn't going to come back from this, this would be her end. If she couldn't swim, then who was she? Who would she be? And how could she ever be okay if she couldn't swim?

She pushed her feet off of the bottom of the pool and surfaced to find Margaret crouching at the edge of the pool, too far away to be within reach or speaking distance. Around her, other coaches were looking too, knowing that someone was down, knowing that something had gone wrong. Sure, these girls could swim, but nonetheless, there were still worries of how to speak to parents about how at a standard high school function their daughter drowned. Across the water, Bedelia's and Margaret's eyes met; Bedelia pulled her goggles off with her good arm, ripped away her swim cap, slapped them down onto the water. Treading, she looked to Margaret and wordlessly, intensely shook her head.

At the end of the day, she would be on the bottom of the standings for her race, her time replaced with three horrible letters. 

_DU MAURIER - DNF_

* * *

The other girls went back to campus with the assistant coach while Bedelia and Margaret went to the nearest hospital. Eventually, they would take a taxi home, but for now, they sat in the emergency department's waiting room, Margaret's arms crossed over her chest, Bedelia's shoulder in a makeshift wrap done up by some coach who had seemed rather unqualified to wrap anything. A couple minutes earlier, a gunshot victim had been brought in by ambulance, so the wait time would be long. _This isn't emergent,_  Margaret had said while other coaches prompted her to take Bedelia to a hospital, but what had swayed Margaret in the end was the way the other girls had looked at Bedelia, as if this was one symptom of a larger problem. Yes, her shoulder hurt now, but in a week, she would have _two_  bad shoulders, and a drug problem, and a bastard pregnancy. Take her to a hospital, and someone of a higher pay grade would sort her out. Of course, Margaret knew to oblige. 

A small child played with blocks in what must have been intended to be the children's corner but instead was a decrepit pile of broken crayons and used coloring books, the child's mother sitting alongside and wearing a breathing mask over her face. In the middle of the room, an old man kept nodding out in his chair, only to wake after falling over. A couple quarreled next to Margaret and Bedelia, talking about who would take Jenny to her dance class on Monday. 

"You should have told me."

Margaret's tone was dark, making Bedelia's heart rate quicken. Looking over, Bedelia saw the stoic look on Margaret's face combined with the twitch of her neck. Margaret was angry, but she only wanted Bedelia to know that.

"I have been telling you," Bedelia gave, instantly regretting her words.

"Yeah," Margaret huffed a humorless laugh, "right. So I should've known you'd gas out today. You weren't supposed to be a fucking burnout."

Trying to make words, failing to find something to say, Bedelia forced, "I didn't know this would happen."

"So you haven't been in pain?" Margaret's tone grew louder but just barely. No one else looked their way. Bedelia almost wished this woman would scream in rage, for then someone would notice, and Bedelia wouldn't be the only witness to what Margaret said to her. Then, someone else could tell her why this hurt so much. Someone else could tell her why her hands were shaking. "You haven't been icing? You didn't go into today thinking you wouldn't finish the race?"

Bedelia couldn't speak, couldn't even think, but Margaret took her lack of response as a response, stating, "You knew this would happen. You knew we didn't stand a chance, but you didn't say anything. If you'd spoken up, we could've benched you, and regionals or no regionals, you wouldn't have a _did not finish_ on your record. You know who gets those? Losers, that's who, and if recruiting coaches see that, they're going to want an explanation. And you know what their explanation is going to be?"

Bedelia felt as if she couldn't breathe, as if she were choking, but no one else seemed to think something was wrong. The waiting room continued to wait. This was only frightening for her. What was wrong with her?

"Their explanation is going to be that your career peaked," Margaret gave, "or if it didn't peak, then it was a fluke. You're never going to top your best times. You're always going to be a shadow of one record. And you know what those kinds of swimmers do? They retire early, or they never have a career at all. And you better hope like hell that this isn't a major injury because if it is, then you're the latter."

Looking down at her good hand, Bedelia tried to make a fist.

"You know, I was emotionally invested in you," Margaret lamented. "I thought you were an interesting kid. I thought that, with enough coaching, you could be the next big thing. But all you are is a burnout. A complete and utter waste of my time."

Once they were taken back to a room, Bedelia lay back on the examination table, resting her arms, closing her eyes. By now, it was nine in the evening, and her hair was drying in unattractive ways, and she wasn't wearing a brassiere or underwear, her shoulder making it too hard to put those on properly. Despite her sweatshirt, one flaunting her surname and swim team number, she shivered, the hospital cold and uncomfortable. She wanted to go home.

The doctor who came in and introduced herself was young, naturally dark-blonde, and wearing her hair in a low messy bun. She didn't need makeup, and somehow, the hospital's light fell in the proper places of her newly-forming wrinkles, perhaps aging her but letting her wear that age well. Bedelia softened for the moment.

"If you would turn onto your stomach," the doctor said, so Bedelia did as instructed, relying on her right arm for the motion. The doctor gently extended Bedelia's left arm, making Bedelia wince in the process. Pushing down on one part of Bedelia's shoulder, the doctor asked, "Any pain?"

"Yes," Bedelia said, speech coming in a forced single word. With how much the position hurt, she couldn't manage anything else.

The doctor shifted position, found another sport that made Bedelia wince.

"Pain?"

"Yes."

Another shift, this time making Bedelia audibly yelp. The doctor rubbed her thumb in that area, the agony making Bedelia want to scream.

"This is more extensive than was described to me," the doctor said. "We'll need an M.R.I." 

"To see if it's torn?" Margaret asked.

Bedelia tensed at the woman's voice; she'd forgotten that Margaret was in the room, felt oddly exposed being prone in front of her, oddly vulnerable. 

"It's clearly torn," the doctor gave. "We'll need to see in how many areas in order to plan for surgery."

For a moment, Bedelia didn't register the word, her mind comfortably blank, the idea of it still foreign. Her shoulder still merely hurt. The tenseness in the room, that was illusory; she was just tired from the meet, tired from her pain, tired because the ride with Margaret here had made her all too anxious. A word was merely a word until it wasn't. Right now, her skin was still intact, and no one had been inside her, not in any way. She hadn't even had her tonsils taken. If someone needed surgery, it surely wasn't her.

The doctor escorted Bedelia to imaging, asking Margaret to stay behind. _Routine procedure,_  the doctor had said, _for patients and medical personnel only._  Even when Margaret had used words like _moral support,_  the doctor hadn't budged. After refusing a wheelchair, Bedelia had been offered a sling for the walk, a loose one that merely let her relax her arm. As they walked together, she could see the contrast of others throughout the hospital, the difference between the sick and the well; all too obviously, she wasn't one of the latter. 

"So," the doctor said as they followed the signs for imaging, "your mother can be intense."

Bedelia huffed a laugh uncomfortably. With the sling on, she thankfully didn't end up in pain from laughing. 

"She isn't my mother," Bedelia said. 

"Who is she, then?"

"My swimming coach."

"And why aren't your parents here?"

"My father's dead," Bedelia gave. "My mother lives in England. Or...well, she's there now."

"Are you a citizen?"

"An English citizen?"

"No, an American."

"I'm not."

"Are you a minor?"

"Yes, I'm-"

"Has your coach contacted your mother at all?"

Bedelia hesitated, then gave, "Not that I know of."

Before the doctor could speak again, Bedelia forced out, "My mother doesn't speak English. It's complicated. And if this were serious, Margaret would've called."

"Unless we can manage parental contact," the doctor gave, "I'm going to need to bring a social worker in."

"That's not necessary," Bedelia said, too quickly for comfort. "Margaret's taken the place of a guardian for me plenty of times. I swear, she was there the last time I was injured. No one thought anything of it."

Of course, it was a lie, but given that Margaret had picked her up from the airport, had taken her to Oregon, it seemed like a lie worth telling, like a lie that was better for the world at large than the actual truth would be.

"It's not personal preference," the doctor gave. "It's a matter of legality."

"She'll sign any papers you ask for," Bedelia furthered. "My mother doesn't speak English. She's always found it easier to have Margaret work with me instead."

"Is there something wrong beyond just your shoulder?"

The question made Bedelia pause, her mind going blank for the moment. Though she wanted to say no, she found that she couldn't speak, couldn't form the word. Saying yes could mean going home with someone else, going back to school in a different person's car. Saying yes could mean that people outside of the school would look into Margaret. Though Bedelia wanted to say no, she felt the awkward weight of something beyond herself, the sense that she could end so many things with just a word. She was sixteen; sixteen-year-olds had power over adults in this way, particularly adults in charge. If the school was given reasons to question Margaret, Bedelia might not have to deal with the day-in, day-out sensation of being watched by a coach, of knowing that her worth to someone only concerned whether or not she could swim. _What if i can't swim?_  she asked herself, pretending that she didn't know the answer to such a question. _If I can't swim, what is Margaret going to do? If I have a surgery, who will be there for me when I wake up?_

ontrol, she knew, was a horrific, disdainful illusion, so she looked to the doctor and said, "No, there isn't anything else wrong."

* * *

"Oh, poor baby," Mathilde said the next morning, sitting at the foot of Bedelia's bed, one hand holding her box of cigarettes, the other on Bedelia's knee. "Surgery? Never good."

Bedelia had gone back to school with her arm in a sling, her shoulder stabilized, her sports season over. In a week, she would have the surgery she needed if she ever wanted to swim again, and after months of healing and physical therapy, she might be able to go back to swimming. Last night, Margaret took her home, the hour past two in the morning; she had listed to Margaret say how her only option now for college would be something called a redshirt, something Bedelia didn't quite understand. If a university was genuinely interested in Bedelia, then they would recruit her despite the injury, giving her time to heal while keeping her on the team, claiming they had _redshirted_  her. It seemed like an ideal compromise, the promise that her performance would go back to normal once she was given time to improve, but it was still a cost, one that would make the bigger universities question her viability. _With your grades,_  Margaret had said, _the Ivy League is out. You're not cream of the crop anymore. You're just like everyone else now._

During her late-night scan, the machine claustrophobic and loud, Bedelia had forced the exhausted emergency technicians to redo the imaging because she'd started to cry. _If you need a sedative, we can provide one,_  they'd said to Bedelia through the noise-canceling headphones she wore, but Bedelia had said no to the drug. Before the scan even started, they'd asked her if she wanted them to put the sound of the radio through her headphones, to which she'd said yes; when they'd asked what kind of music she would like, she took a moment, then said classical. Amidst the noise of the M.R.I., her head trapped within the machine, her arm immobilized and her whole body shaky with exhaustion and fear, she'd cried to Strauss' "Wiener Blut," the waltz feeling poorly timed, the pillow beneath her head damp with stubborn tears. She doubted the technicians had appreciated the music.

Though Bedelia had expected that, given how quickly gossip traveled around campus, Mathilde would have known that Bedelia's shoulder needed surgery, Mathilde had come in shocked to find Bedelia in a sling, brow furrowed, lips pursed. _Not right!_  Mathilde had said. _This coach, what she has done to you!_

"Smoke," Mathilde gave, then pulled out a cigarette. "No more pain. Good for energy."

But Bedelia didn't like smoking, so she didn't take the cigarette, left Mathilde to shrug her off and go to the window, prop it open so that they wouldn't make the room smell. It was a Sunday, so Mathilde was wearing a big, bulky sweater and no pants. 

"You see, you are living too fast," Mathilde said, flicking her lighter, pushing her hair out of her face. "You say, yes, American girl, I will be like these American girls. I will say, no! No rest, no stop. There is a word for this, _mais non?_ "

Exhaling, feeling the pain of even just an exhale, Bedelia gave, "Burnout."

" _Oui,_  burnout!" Mathilde made Fossey fingers, nearly dropping her cigarette. "Burnout, _c'est le pire. Je deteste!_ " 

Mathilde took a drag, went on tiptoe, went down. She always had a strange restlessness to her, a sense that there was too much energy for her small body, a sense that she used more effort back home. Sometimes, she told Bedelia stories of the clubs, of places where she would go to meet _les beaux garçons_  and kiss and dance and drink. When Bedelia had first had alcohol, her father had been alive, and her whole family had been sitting down to a tense, terse Christmas dinner. Pouring for her mother, the cook that overlooked the two girls, to which their father had said, _here, offer the girls some._  Stella had thought it tasted bad. Bedelia had liked how the flavor implied something to come, something more; though the wine tasted strange now, she would someday grow to enjoy the metallic nature of it, the dark notes of bitter flavor. She liked that there were still parts of herself that would develop. She liked the sense that what was in front of her thankfully wasn't final.

"You see, home. Home, we do _not_  burnout," Mathilde gave. "Home, we say, take it easy, relax! No, we do _not_  burnout. You see, you need a vacation. You need not to swim. You shall rest, _ma petite!_   _Dans la campagne, avec quelques beaux garçons. C'est vrai!_ "

After the injury and the poorly-spent night, Bedelia didn't have enough energy to be French, so she nodded along even though the movement hurt, pretended that the statement was true. 

"They say, _surgery,_ " Mathilde said, trying to make her voice sound spooky. She tapped out the cigarette against Bedelia's windowsill, leaving a burn-mark behind. "I say, no! Rest, relax. Your arm, she is _tired._  She needs good sex and sleep."

At the absurdity of the statement, Bedelia laughed, making Mathilde look at her questioningly.

"What, I am not a doctor?" Mathilde gave, walking over to Bedelia, leaving her cigarettes by the window. "These doctors, they know _nothing._  They see you; they think, oh, broken arm! But I say, no, no, no! She needs to _relax._  See?"

Fingers spread, Mathilde brought her palms to Bedelia's stomach, right beneath her sling. The contact made Bedelia still, the sensation of warmth against her shirt odd and disconcerting. 

Taking a deep breath herself, Mathilde prompted, " _Breathe!_  Into here. _Respirez, s'il vous plaît!_ "

So Bedelia took a deep breath, felt the discomfort in her shoulder but relaxed at the sensation of Mathilde's hands moving with her belly. She wished Mathilde would slide her hands underneath Bedelia's shirt, feel the skin beneath. She didn't know why, felt uncomfortable with not knowing why, but she wanted Mathilde closer.

"See?" Mathilde prompted. "Relax!"

"Mathilde-"

" _No,_ " Mathilde said, "no talk. Breathe."

Bedelia followed the instruction, then tensed as Mathilde moved one of her hands away, watched as Mathilde brought her fingertips to Bedelia's eyelids, closed Bedelia's eyes. Growing hyper-sensitive to the touch, Bedelia felt how Mathilde trailed her fingers down the slide of Bedelia's face, avoided Bedelia's shoulder as she settled on Bedelia's side, cupping her hand there, holding on. Bedelia wished she could hug this girl, could lie back in bed and hug her, but she couldn't move her arm, and she thought such a thing might be childish to Mathilde, uncomfortable. Girls who went to clubs and found beautiful boys didn't want to be hugged.

Had Bedelia known what a real kiss felt like, she would've understood the action immediately, but when it happened, she instead was relaxed, stilled, blissfully unthinking. The feeling of Mathilde's lips on her own took a moment, then another moment, then the slight, wet movement of greater passion in order for her to understand the action. Eyes forcefully opening, Bedelia looked at this girl, then used her good arm to push the girl away, cheeks reddening, face flushed. _Deep breath,_  she told herself, then cursed the statement, cursed Mathilde's idea of _breathing,_ cursed every muscle, tendon, ligament, bone, _everything_  in her shoulder, cursed Margaret and the whole swim team and her dead father and her worthless, withdrawn, idiotic mother. She cursed her stupid little sister, who somehow even deserved someone better than Bedelia as a sibling. She cursed Mathilde that her first kiss would be one coming from a place of pity and pain.

"Get out," Bedelia forced, not knowing what tone to use, not knowing what tone to manage, her shoulder pulling with the effort, her heartbeat loud in her temples. 

Mathilde furrowed her brow and smirked, as if this were all a joke, as if Bedelia was pointlessly angry, so Bedelia forced once more, " _Get out!_ "

So Mathilde took her cigarettes, shrugged off the interaction, and headed to the door, sweater hiked up so that Bedelia could see her underwear, the silky nature of it, the pale peach color so un-American and un-English and so very, _very_  French. By the time the door shut behind Mathilde, Bedelia's mind had gone blank, horribly blank, the kind of blank that made her not want to get out of bed for days on end, but now, her bed was a place where two girls had kissed, and she needed to be elsewhere, _anywhere,_  but she knew nowhere would have her. She couldn't go to Margaret's office, to the pool, to the gym, to a library or classroom or dining hall; wherever she went, she would be a walking spectacle, either the injured swimmer or the _freak,_  now for more reasons than one. If Mathilde told anyone about this, Bedelia wasn't sure what would happen, whether or not she would even still be able to go to this school. _But why would it matter?_  Bedelia thought. _No one here likes me. No one here wants to know me. What harm is there in leaving? No one would ever miss me, not even Mathilde. Not even Margaret._

She leaned back in bed, tried wedging a pillow under her shoulder, felt the ache of a new position but submitted to that position nonetheless. The ceiling above her was pockmarked and old, the building having aged eighty years. She mapped each mark until they made a constellation, then named that constellation _end._  The end of her swimming career, the end of her only friendship, the end of someone loving her. She looked back and forth among the makeshift stars until the afternoon bled into night, until falling asleep wouldn't get her in trouble, and then slept.

* * *

The infirmary's protocol claimed that any medical needs at night would be met by an on-duty faculty member, the staff shifting each night; if Bedelia wanted a pain reliever, she would need to wake someone up and ask. Tonight, the person on duty was a science teacher who had never met Bedelia before and who was particularly old, so Bedelia was hesitant to get up, to wake an elderly woman and say _hello, my name is Bedelia, I would like an aspirin please._  Nonetheless, her shoulder ached, and because the hospital staff had been unwilling to give her something stronger, she was left to take only faculty-proffered aspirin, a pill she would need to wake someone in order to get. At three in the morning, she couldn't bear to wake someone up, but she couldn't stand the pain either.

 _I know where Margaret keeps hers,_  she thought, so she stood, pulled a coat over her sling, wore slippers even though she was going outside. She could've walked the route to Margaret's home with her eyes closed, so she didn't pay attention to where she walked, instead saw how deeply dark the world was around her, how intense the look of trees and security lights against the sky was. At Margaret's doorstep, the front light clicked on, having sensed Bedelia's motion. She hoped she wouldn't wake anyone up.

Maybe a year ago, Margaret had given Bedelia a key, so she figured that she wasn't trespassing, that she wasn't doing anything wrong. Softly, she shut the front door behind her, felt the kenopsia of a dark, lifeless, sleep-worn apartment. She saw the couch she'd slept on multiple times, the chipped mugs for coffee, the plastic letter magnets on the fridge all spelled into either grocery lists or expletives. Normally, she saw this place as full of color, even the yellowing of the kitchen tiles adding life to this place, but now, it was in a greyscale, recognizable but eerily so, a place now haunted even though people had lived here just years before. Though Bedelia had such fond memories of this place, she felt a nagging sense that this would be her last time here, that she wouldn't want to come back again. All she needed was aspirin; once she got her aspirin, she would be able to get out. 

She went into the bathroom, being careful not to step in the creaky spots, making sure she opened the medicine cabinet slowly. Surely enough, there was the bottle of aspirin; in the dark, Bedelia read the dosage information, then took out ten pills, the extras intended to keep her from coming back here again. In her dormitory, she would get water from the bathroom sinks and take a dose, so for now, she would shove the pills into her pocket and leave. When she turned around, she caught a darkened glance at herself in the mirror and winced, the strangeness of seeing her own face daunting. She used to be prettier, didn't she? Now, she just seemed scared, like a cornered mouse, like someone whose life was directed by threats and horror. She was someone who ran from danger, not someone who confronted it, but how could she confront this kind of danger? If she told the administrators about Margaret, then she would potentially cost Margaret her job, and she knew how hard it had been for Margaret to even get a job in the first place. If she was pulled from the swim team because of her actions, then she would never get into college, period. If she made some brash statement about how victimized she had been, the girls would only continue to make fun of her. How could she confront the kind of danger that would only hurt her more? There was some kind of strength, she figured, in knowing that she must run, and to then just start running.

Halfway to the front door, she thought she heard something, so she stilled, glanced side-to-side, stared peripherally at the bedroom. Someone was in there, someone who wasn't Margaret herself. Her curiosity overcame her better judgement, so Bedelia crept toward the door, no lights on in the closed-off bedroom, only the delicate, strange sounds of people breathing, people existing, people without judgement or agenda. When she leaned forward, tried to listen in, she tensed, knowing what those kinds of sounds meant, knowing that she'd never heard such a thing this closely or this intimately before. When she'd walked in on a girl in the locker room, there hadn't been intimacy, had only been urgency and teenage lust, but now, there was something deeper, something private. The girl in the locker room had stolen a moment; Margaret and someone else were taking a moment that rightfully belonged to them. Was it supposed to be enchanting or repulsive? Bedelia didn't know why she wanted to listen, just for a moment, and then flee. As she went to the door, left the place, locked the door behind her, she didn't understand how such a thing could happen. Why were people awake at three in the morning? Why didn't they speak to each other while doing _that?_  Didn't they have to communicate in some way? Bedelia didn't understand how such a thing could work, and strangely, she found that she didn't _want_  to understand, that she didn't want to think about boys or girls or kissing or sex or why Margaret would have a man over - at least, Bedelia assumed that had been a man - on a Sunday night, or rather a Monday morning, at three in the morning. Or maybe he'd stayed for dinner, and she'd made him something tasty, and she'd made him feel special and then had sex with him and then had sex with him again, and tomorrow, she would teach a class as if that was the most normal thing in the world, and nothing bad would happen, but nothing good would happen either. 

Why were other girls so obsessed with these grownup things, like cigarettes, like dancing and sex and boys? Bedelia just wanted to swim. She wanted to go to college, and she wanted to swim, but what others wanted was to spread rumors about her and laugh when she hurt herself, to say _finally, the varsity roster's a little more free, someone else gets their rightful place._  She just wanted to swim, but she couldn't swim anymore. She wasn't even sure if she would be able to go to college. While everyone else kept adding to their lives, she just wanted hers to continue being small, to stay contained. She wanted to be good at something and to have that be enough. 

When she returned to her dormitory, she took a tablet with a handful of water from the bathroom sink, then went back to bed, the sun beginning to rise beyond her window. She hoped she would be numb by classtime, then hoped she would stay numb even after then.


	22. Honey

When Stella woke, Bedelia wasn't in bed again, but based on the ajar bathroom door, the empty hanger left on the closet, she'd returned at some point. Checking her phone, Stella found the time just past seven, her body inching closer to adjusting to the time change. _Right in time to go home,_  she thought, pulling her legs out from underneath the covers, feeling the telltale ache on her thigh. Now, she - or, rather, Bedelia - would have to check the wounds, dress them again, hope there wasn't an infection. It felt like reliving high school, how stupidly quotidian this once had been and now how inconvenient and immature it seemed. Earlier in her life, this had been the only thing that worked, and if she did it now, all she received was punishment. All along, she'd known that cravings were liars, but they were such effective ones that she sometimes stopped thinking critically and started to listen. Either she could swim half a mile, or she could cut three lines. The consequence of swimming would be sore muscles; the consequence of cutting would be uncomfortable scars, potential infections, and a return to zero days clean. She could build herself upon self-creation or self-destruction. She clearly knew which one was easier.

Bedelia didn't self-destruct, not in any way that Stella could see. Though Stella felt as if last night had been a symptom of a breakdown - she still couldn't stop thinking of Bedelia's shaking hands, holding ornate chopsticks and looking out of place - Bedelia's version of a breakdown was as quiet and professional as her occupation seemed to be; she called on someone trusted - someone whose role in Bedelia's life Stella couldn't quite understand - and asked for help. After their mother's death, after finding Stella bloodied on the bathroom floor, Bedelia just called and asked for help. It was simple yet so unbelievably complex, the sheer action of it, how there wasn't explosive anger or volatile tears. Despite what Bedelia had felt, she hadn't been overwhelmed by her emotions. For Stella, such things were either too much or nonexistent; if she was upset, she couldn't call, couldn't even move at times, too bone-deep panicked for her nervous system to function adequately, and if she was numb, she could feel everything but without true sensation, like an echo of an emotion, like an afterthought. She had trouble finding an in-between.

But this morning, she had found something akin to that in-between. While she spoke to Reed, her voice shaking at times, taking deep breaths between her statements, asking for a moment to collect her thoughts, she'd been overwhelmed, but she'd also been able to feel. She'd felt the anger at herself for letting Tanya slip away, for lying, for omitting what she could, for being needlessly rude. She'd felt the sadness of losing this woman, of never acting on the little fantasies she'd had about Reed, of letting her own fear stifle something that she so valued. She'd felt the horror of vulnerability, making her feel naked and helpless before this woman, admitting that she was defeated and may never be able to overcome. In the past, she'd been hurt, and she was now guarded because of it. If she were an outside critic, she would call bullshit on the situation immediately. 

 _But I don't want to be like this anymore,_  she'd told Reed, breathing in time and hoping that she wouldn't cry, _because being like this hurts people like you. And it hurts me too._

Of course, Reed hadn't been particularly forthcoming, had still been cautious, and Stella didn't blame her for it. She wasn't expecting Reed to call back again, no matter how much one small part of her still hoped for a call. In the end, all she could do was remember that she'd felt everything, had gone through that overwhelm, and could wake up that morning with a sense of relief. The start of a headache and an uncomfortable grogginess, yes, but relief as well.

When Stella came into the kitchen, she found Bedelia awake and somehow already dressed and made-up. As Stella, still in pajamas, still bandaged from the night before, sat down at the kitchen table, Bedelia worked with a steel-looking espresso machine, using the dipped tools and presses that Stella didn't know the names of. Bedelia had already gotten out two mugs.

"I have cleaners coming in two hours," Bedelia gave, her back to Stella as she shoved parts of the machine together, metal on metal. "I would like to clear her room before they come."

Of course, Bedelia didn't need to specify which room this was; Stella cringed at the thought, at the broken vials and open journals and the eerie feeling that the money in this house, the dead woman in a hospital's morgue, Bedelia's degrees and perhaps even Stella's, were all bloodied. 

"I have left the items worth keeping in certain places," Bedelia gave. "The rest can be thrown away. I don't expect us to take longer than an hour."

Bedelia toyed with the buttons of the machine, finding proper settings, then added, "Afterward, I think I would like to go shopping."

For a moment, Stella found that the words didn't register, the comment seeming to be an illusion, something crafted by the mind for hilarity's sake.

"Shopping," Stella tried to confirm.

With her back to Stella, Bedelia gave, "I enjoy indulgence in the wake of emotional complexity."

Thinking of emotional complexity, Stella weighed her words, tried to articulate what she meant without saying too much. 

"The closet in her room was a mess," Stella said.

"A tactful mess," Bedelia said. The machine hissed, then let dark espresso drip into two adjacent shot glasses below. "I had a finite amount of space."

"What is it we're keeping, then?"

Going to the fridge, Bedelia pulled out a glass bottle of milk, set the bottle alongside the metal vessel for foaming the milk. Though Stella so greatly loved coffee, she had to admit that she knew next to nothing about the craft of making coffee while it seemed as though Bedelia, with her single-origin beans in an ornate little package and her burr grinder, knew everything. 

Bedelia took the finished shots, poured them daintily into the two mugs.

"Don't be coy," she said, filling the metal pot with milk, letting off steam from the wand. 

"Coy," Stella repeated, gaze boring into her sister's back. 

"You know what I know," Bedelia gave, tilting the mugs full of espresso, using gentle movements from her thin wrists to level the milk in. "We share an unwanted truth about which I would prefer not to speak."

"Yes, a _shared truth._ "

Bedelia set one of the mugs in front of Stella, then sat in the chair alongside her sister. Gently, fluidly, Bedelia brought the mug to her painted lips, took a sip.

"You're minimizing," Stella insisted incredulously. "You're...simply the fact that I know puts me in an undeniably challenging professional and ethical situation. If I don't report this-"

"Then it will be forgotten." Bedelia gave what could pass as a smile, so long as the smile was merely implied and never actualized. "I will keep the journals, as well as a few boxes. The rest, I believe, is unimportant."

Bedelia took another sip, the mug half-empty against her painted fingers, eyes cast sideways to look at her sister; this wasn't a negotiation so much as a debriefing, so no matter what Stella said, Bedelia would repeat the same statement again, this time with smaller, more forceful words. So, a family secret. Stella had certainly kept worse, but nonetheless, it felt wrong to have seen those names, to remember their mother's pen-scratches indicating that yet another man was dead in her name. Had Bedelia met all of them? So far as Stella knew, she herself had only met one, but nonetheless, there were many, a series of men used for money, opting for someone new every few years once the money disappeared or the man perhaps became too boring. And though Stella could scoff at it, could feel the repulsion and wished so deeply that she had never been associated with this woman, she could remember being in clubs, going home with rich older men, taking two-hundred quid from their wallets before she sneaked out of the bedrooms these men's wives had decorated. She herself had looked at a man, one she used for money, and thought of killing him. If she could think of killing, then how could she begrudge her mother for committing the act?

 _Was Bedelia ever involved?_  Stella wondered as she watched her sister set down her mug, the white ceramic scarred by her lipstick. _Did she ever take part?_

But it would be a family secret now. Stella didn't even know if their mother had been a citizen, let alone how she herself could go about reporting such crimes. Given the flimsy evidence, there would likely never be a trial, especially if these men had never had their deaths investigated previously. By the end of today, all that would exist of their mother's history would be a few boxes of memories and some clothes to donate. These men had already died once; given that Stella couldn't do anything for them now, she forced herself to think it best not to exhume them. A family secret, kept between the last two women in the family in order to honor their dead mother. It made Stella feel sick to think about, but she took a sip of her coffee despite the nausea, forcing the feelings down. Unsurprisingly, Bedelia made a brilliant cup of coffee.

The bedroom, still a disaster, seemed to bow in respect as Bedelia walked in, the bloodstains on the floor having darkened and crusted, the opened drawers looking less chaotic as she walked by each one. In her wrap dress, she was feminine and poised but intense, the grey color flattering against her hips, the quality fabric showing that all of the cleaning she would do today would be minimal and done with flicks of the wrist. She unfurled two garbage bags, telling Stella that one would be for things to throw away and the other for things to be donated. Though Stella already knew how to clean a room of a deceased woman, she paused at the thought of Bedelia donating to Goodwill, Bedelia putting unused things in anything other than a bin.

As Bedelia sat on the bed, legs crossed, still wearing shoes, she looked up at Stella and gave the instructions, the streamlined methods of removing the evidence that their mother had once lived here. Things like clothes and linens would be given away while the television and DVD player would be kept, used for future guests; the pertinent items in the closet would be packed in banker's boxes and stored in a place that Bedelia wouldn't disclose. Opening the drawers, Stella took out pajamas, medical supplies to be donated. Already, the oxygen tanks were gone from the room, returned so that someone else could survive using such things. By the time Stella finished with the drawers, Bedelia was already halfway through the closet, the bed having been stripped, all of the linens left in their respective bags. 

"There's so little," Stella commented, for a moving-out room should've looked more chaotic in its demolishing; instead, this room just looked as if it were returning to its original purpose, like an unused dormitory room at the end of a school year. "Didn't she have...."

Stella didn't finish the sentence. Not facing her sister, Bedelia gave, "She sold most before the move."

Yes, _the move,_  a move from one continent to another. Their mother hadn't been the kind of woman to preserve her wedding dress - or dresses - and keep them in her closet, the black bags in the back reminding her of beautiful days, but Stella still found the lack of attachment out of place, almost inhuman.

"But what about pictures?" Stella asked. "Or...her makeup, maybe."

"She hadn't worn makeup in years."

Hadn't? Stella didn't know what to make of such a word yet.

"She tried," Bedelia said, standing up and taking down a stack of French books, ones whose covers gave away that they were translated Harlequin. Stella hadn't realized such books existed, and given the state of this country, Stella hadn't a clue as to where Bedelia could've found such books. "But in the homes, they don't want things like lipsticks. Choking hazard, I suppose. A week later, I saw one of the attendants wearing red lipstick that didn't match her coloring. I pretended not to know where she had found the shade."

While Stella stilled, Bedelia kept unpacking the closet, stacking the journals on the mattress, making sure that those were to be put in a specific box.

"It's alright to ask," Bedelia gave in wake of Stella's silence. "I realize that it's uncomfortable for you."

Looking down at the journals, Stella said, "It wasn't as if she loved me."

Bedelia didn't go to correct, to comfort. Stella hadn't expected her to do either, but nonetheless, she felt the slight twinge of how proper such a statement was. _My mother never loved me._  It seemed so concrete, so upsetting, but now, Stella felt only a twinge and nothing more. _My mother never loved me. The guest room I'm staying in has vomit on the floor. In a few hours, I'll be shopping with my sister. I think I'm in love with someone I've only ever hurt._

"She never remembered giving birth to us," Bedelia said, tone detached. "I asked once, out of medical curiosity."

"Scopolamine," Stella gave, taking to the journals, packing them into their specified box. "Around the world, it's occasionally still used."

"The first few hours of life are integral for infant attachment."

"And do you ever remember feeling attached?"

Bedelia didn't answer, instead kept pulling things from the closet, two shoeboxes of photographs and old passports, a binder of basic legal documents. Of course, these things, the most basic evidence of human life, would be kept, if only for proof of citizenship or historical accuracy; the remainder would never be seen again. Though Stella felt some obligation toward the shoeboxes, felt as if she should take a family photograph or outdated identification, she found that she just wanted the boxes to remain closed. 

When Bedelia didn't want to stand on a chair in order to reach the highest portions of the closet, Stella stepped up, bare feet tensing on a chair she feared wouldn't hold her weight. Bedelia passed her a flashlight and told her to ignore the dust and see if anything else was worth removing. Up there, Stella found another few books, scrap paper, spare socks and other tiny things that long ago had been forgotten; when Stella tried to pass each thing down to Bedelia, Bedelia stood completely still, arms at her sides, knowing Stella's intention but never heeding to it, so Stella huffed a breath, threw each thing toward the donations bag with as best an aim as she could manage. Most items, of course, didn't make it into the bag. 

Sliding her arm across the expanse of the upper shelf, Stella checked for what she couldn't otherwise see, stilled at the sensation of a plastic sandwich bag. She peeled the bag from the shelf, then held the flashlight toward the bag. At first, she denied the contents, but with light, it was clear that this bag was filled with marijuana, not much but enough to prove that some had been used while plenty had been left behind. Out of shock, Stella laughed, the sight within their mother's closet incredulous. 

"Yes?" Bedelia asked from below, so Stella dangled the bag down toward her sister, used her other hand to cover her mouth while she laughed.

"Did you get this for her," Stella asked, "or did you get this for yourself?"

"Stella-"

"Doesn't your country prescribe such things?" Stella shook her head, laughing. "Where did you get this from? A sixteen-year-old at the mall?"

"It's not any of your-"

"How old is it?"

Bedelia paused, then said, "I don't like whatever you're thinking about."

"Oh, come on. How old is it?"

"No more than a few months. Give it here."

"Absolutely not."

"Stella-"

"How about this," Stella said, shaking the bag. "You share this with me, and I'll never even _think_  about reporting her crimes."

"Fine," Bedelia conceded. Furrowing her eyebrows, Stella looked down at her sister, unsure of what to think of such a response. The proposal had been offhanded, half-joking, intended to give Stella some excuse to trivialize the family name. Maybe Bedelia wouldn't have needed prompting otherwise.

"Tonight," Stella prompted further, reaching for Bedelia's hand, asking for help down from the chair. Of course, Bedelia didn't offer a hand. "You know, after dinner. This evening."

Bedelia huffed in annoyance as Stella put the chair back, closed the closet doors.

"You are an incredibly intolerable person," Bedelia gave, leaving the room with shrugged-off finality. 

The boxes would be taken out. Now, the drawers were empty, the bed stripped, everything ready for the cleaners. In even just a week's time, this room might be fit for a guest, someone who would never know that a woman had nearly died in here so recently. Even Stella's own guest room would be converted back to something sterile and white, no stains on the carpets, no odd smells, no evidence. Thinking of her own apartment, Stella wondered what would be left after her death, what others would choose to value. If their mother was only two shoeboxes' worth of a person, what would Stella be? And what would Bedelia be? Stella had old photographs of herself with her sister, photographs that Bedelia might choose to save, but she didn't have many. Though tangibility was not a measurement of a human being's worth, Stella could think of Jo's old journals on her own shelf and wonder about marks left on the world. There was something viscerally important to her about leaving traces behind.

Following Bedelia out, Stella turned off the light in the bedroom, looked at the strange, boxed-up emptiness. Stella wouldn't die in a room like this. No, she wasn't going to be worth only two shoeboxes. She hoped that her sister wouldn't be either.

* * *

"Have you called a car?" Stella asked, shifting from foot to foot, uncomfortable with the prospect. Shopping, with her sister. The last time they'd done that, they must have been maybe six and eight, retrieving school uniforms with Daddy, purchasing little bows at a shop in town so that they would have something pretty to wear on the first day of school. Though Stella loved beautiful things, and though her shopping tended to be high-end, she felt lackluster in comparison to her sister, who put on Yves St. Laurent lipstick as if it were balm, whose handbags were insured. There was indulgence, and there was affluence; they both knew which category each of them fell into. 

"No," Bedelia gave, going into the coat-closet by the entrance, reaching to a box held up on a ledge inside, "I thought we would drive."

"We?"

 _So she has a driving license,_  Stella thought. She would have to text Reed and tell her. Or, well, maybe she would wait a day.

"Wrong side of the road." Bedelia pulled car keys from the box, then closed the closet and turned to Stella. "Shall we?"

She motioned for Stella to head out of the house, so Stella opened the door with unease, looked at her sister with mild distrust. Outside, the day was an American kind of warm, just a little humid, the sun hot and unrelenting. Early summer, the kind that made schoolchildren fidget in their seats, the world beyond their classrooms so enticing in its unending brightness, that was the weather they were having, something Stella had seen plenty of times in films but never truly experienced. Back home, she always remembered rainy summers, cold winters, coats and boots and blurring seasons, late sunsets that she had never realized were late until she found herself retiring so early in the days leading up to Bedelia's college graduation day. Emily, Greg's little sister, had so valiantly and kindly offered to host Stella in her bedroom, and citing Stella's jet lag and Emily's wish to be a good host, the two would go to bed early, far away from the quiet, dramatic chaos that Bedelia, a college boyfriend, the college boyfriend's affluent parents, and Madam du Maurier could provide; the two would talk about England as if it were some far-off, exotic place, and Stella would pepper in stories of how _Bea_  - that was what everyone called Bedelia here, except for Mum, who just made a nasally noise when referring to Bedelia and no sound when referring to Stella - had been while growing up. It was strange, how Greg and his family could be so sociable and friendly while Bedelia remained aloof and unknown, loved but always out of reach. Though it was obvious from how he touched her, commended her, and made her smile in little girlish ways that Greg loved Bedelia, Stella could still feel minuscule transgressions, so small that they likely weren't transgressions at all. Maybe it wasn't harm when Greg had mentioned his mother's upcoming birthday, but Stella had watched how Bedelia's brow twitched at the thought of a mother who had a birthday, a mother who deserved a gift. What had Greg been getting her, pearls? It must've been pearls. That whole memory, all of those days, seemed to be punctuated by pearls, be them the ones around Greg's mother's neck as she and her Lilly Pulitzer dress hugged Stella in welcome or the ones Bedelia had worn as earrings to her graduation, the same pair that she'd worn during her high school graduation. Pearls, and a rich Connecticut house with only one guest room, and a mother who made elaborate dinners every night and thought it was charming how Stella held her fork and knife, and long-distance phone cards scratched off in pursuit of just one more time to talk to Jo.

"His little sister is very sweet," Stella had told Jo in one of those phone calls. "She's...I don't know. She's making me feel as if I actually belong here."

"Do you think they'll marry, your sister and this boy?" Jo had asked, for he _was_  a boy, twenty-two and courting her sister like crazy, the two of them staying in New York for medical school. Greg's parents were to pay for an apartment for them to share. After learning that fact, Stella had tried to picture them together in a one-bedroom overlooking the park, Bedelia cooking a roast for dinner while wearing a frilly apron that didn't suit her, Greg hanging his keys by the door and kissing her cheek in lieu of a _honey, I'm home._  There was something intensely unappealing about that image to Stella, and though she'd started to think she knew nothing about her sister anymore, she still couldn't picture Bedelia being happy with that scenario nonetheless.

"I think so," Stella had said, for it had been the truth. By then, Bedelia and Greg had been together for three or four years. Though post-graduation changes could threaten even the strongest of relationships, she couldn't see any reason for them _not_  to be together. Bedelia seemed happy, but then again, Stella had never seen her sister euphoric, only relieved in the interim, only comforted for a moment. Greg wasn't hurting her, and somehow, that seemed as if it should be enough.

"Then I'd say you have some new family," Jo had said, a happy little lilt in her voice.

But after a year, Emily stopped responding to Stella's letters - their way of checking in, a fun little foreign relationship - so Stella assumed that Bedelia and Greg weren't together anymore. A shame, Stella figured but didn't give much thought to. 

With a remote chained to her keys, Bedelia opened the four-car garage attached to the house, and as the doors lifted, Stella found herself cringing further into her _indulgent_  category. If she wanted to put Bedelia down in order to make herself feel better, Stella could comment that there were only three cars in the four-car garage, but there wouldn't be any leveling in that comment, for these cars were elegant, luxurious cars, two of which were convertibles. The Porsche Boxter looked most recent, shimmering and metallic in a navy color, the interior sleek and dark; as Bedelia used the smart-key to start the car, no ignition-turning required, Stella gaped uncomfortably. If the Boxter wasn't impressive enough, then the souped-up 911 alongside it, clearly older but also clearly higher in caliber, would've impressed, the black exterior unmarred despite its age. In the farthest bay was a vintage Cadillac, the white paint gorgeously restored, the car likely dating to the sixties. 

So not only did Bedelia know how to drive, she also knew how to buy cars. And, very clearly, she had the budget for excess. As she sat down in the driver's seat, she let her handbag fall to the passenger's, an almost effortless assertion of power. Forcing herself out of her dumbfounded stare, Stella sidled up to the car, very carefully opened its passenger door, and very carefully sat down. 

"There are scarves and elastics in the glovebox," Bedelia gave, reaching over her sister so that she could pull an Hermes, along with the proper clips, out for herself. 

Not knowing how to tie such a scarf, Stella opted for hairbands instead, twirling her hair into a bun in hope that it wouldn't whip her face; Bedelia pinned the scarf back with ease, pulled a pair of Chanel sunglasses from the console - yes, _driving_  sunglasses, a different pair than her usual - and, looking the part of someone who should own this car, shifted in order to pull the car out of the garage. As they pulled along the long driveway, Bedelia turned on the radio, but after hearing a few bars of cowbell, some E.L.O. song playing, she quickly shut it off again, the motion instinctive enough for Stella to be off-put by it.

Once out of the driveway, Bedelia went from cautious to reckless, almost on tiptoe as she floored the gas, the zero-to-sixty in only a few seconds jolting Stella back. This road wasn't wide or straight enough, let alone unsettled enough, for anyone to take such speeds, but as they came to a bend in the road, Bedelia hardly braked, the movement somehow fluid and controlled but still undeniably over the speed limit. So, her sister had a driving license, but even though her sister couldn't drive well, her sister could drive _well_. Closing her eyes, Stella swallowed and hoped that she wouldn't be motion-sick. 

* * *

The rich, ornate shops to which Bedelia had taken them had a gelateria in between Gucci and Chanel. As they walked by the shop, Stella heeling Bedelia, Stella felt that touristic rush of cold air, the climate controls blasting and the doors left open as proof, and stopped for a moment, taking a deep breath and looking inside. The place had chairs with wired backs fashioned into heart shapes, the kinds of tables that lovers sat at on a second date that would soon enough turn into a third. In the window, all of the desserts were lined up in a rainbow of colors, everything from fresh mint to cotton candy to pomegranate available and topped with fine little decorations. Though their breakfast had been big enough, their lunch light and recent, Stella felt a typical yearning, the kind that came whenever she saw a child with a drippy ice cream cone in summer. Nothing would ever sound as pleasurable as the drip of cold, sweet cream on an incredibly hot day. 

A few paces ahead, Bedelia kept walking, her handbag on one arm, her new lipsticks and shoes in shopping bags on the other. From the back, Bedelia looked like an Old Hollywood actress, her perfect blonde curls resting against the back of her dress, somehow looking as if she were wearing everyday clothes despite the high-end fabric she wore and the white straps of her heels; she was someone intended to wear big, gaudy-on-anyone-else Chanel sunglasses, to hold Armani bags as if they were merely groceries, to spent multiples of what many people in this country paid monthly in rent just on Yves St. Laurent makeup, and she didn't have to defend her status, instead simply had to live as she was in order to prove it to be true. In contrast, Stella felt like a frump in a silk tank and black linen pants, the lightest pair she owned, a pair she hadn't worn in years and had only packed because of how the Celsius-to-Fahrenheit conversion had made her eyes bug. Even with her arms exposed, she was too hot. In contrast, Bedelia seemed as if the only time she would ever sweat would be during a cycling class, toward the end, right in time for an editorial photograph to be taken and for someone to beg her to model for their athleticwear brand. 

And worst of all, Bedelia set the bar for their shopping. They glossed over certain stores with ease; the employees at the stores they did enter recognized Bedelia immediately, brought around specific lipstick shades for her to try, kept her in mind for the summer collections that they now had in-store. For the most part, Stella acted the way that the doting rich boyfriends of the other women in these stores did: she held bags, gave comments of approval, looked bored but in a way that she hoped appeared superior to something as bland as shopping. Though she liked shopping, she preferred places like the London lingerie store that an ex-something had recommended to her years ago, a place that kept her brassiere size up-to-date and knew how she felt about a good balconette; she liked running her fingers over cashmere sweaters and asking if such things came in a size petite, particularly in grey or navy. Even now, she still had Jo's clothes, many of the silk shirts surviving so many years down the line, some of the coats too worn-in to look nice but the one Barbour rain-jacket still in wonderful shape, sent back to the company every few years for a new wax coat. Jo had taught her silently but surely enough that the only clothes worth an expense were ones that would last a lifetime, so leather, proper shoes, wool coats, good tailoring, and fine sweaters were worth much of any price; cotton clothes were, of course, overpriced in stores that sold the worthwhile beautiful things. Jo's theory had proven correct, some of her silk shirts left as wardrobe staples for Stella, but it felt cosmically wrong that clothes meant to last a lifetime had outlasted Jo's lifetime by multiple decades. 

Maybe that was why Bedelia bought overpriced clothes, like a casual-for-her wrap dress made of cotton. _Diane von Furstenberg pioneered the wrap dress,_  one of the shop's employees told Bedelia as she watched herself in the mirror, judging the look, deciding whether or not this dress was forth the five-hundred on the price tag. After all, it was just a casual dress. _She thought that the wrapping motion mimicked a hug. In the morning, it seems only fitting to cover your naked body with a hug, don't you think?_  Despite her look of annoyance at the comment, Bedelia deemed the dress worth the price, then purchased it in three colors. All day, she used the same credit card, one not even available in Stella's country, and all day, the transactions went through. After the five-thousand mark, Stella stopped listening to the transactions and instead looked around at the other women in these shops, at the ones who couldn't afford what they tried on, at the ones who couldn't fit such small sizes. Though shopping could be relaxing for Bedelia, it was anything but for so many women. When Stella wore a large in a certain brand, she found herself cross, not for her own size but for that of so many other women; if Stella was deemed large by a brand, her just-over-five-foot frame and athletic body considered too big, she thought of mothers, of tall women, of women who didn't exercise and women who had a high set-point and of all women who simply wanted to be clothed, and felt angry that any of them could feel lesser for not fitting. Maybe Bedelia could purchase forty-dollar lipsticks she would never use, but other women would mourn how their mascara clumped beneath their bottom-lashes, needing to be brushed away at midday. Social beauty was affluence and almost nothing else. Stella longed for that old Barbour coat, for a rainy day on which to wear it out, for a chance to feel at the little rip inside one of the pockets, a rip whose origin she would never know. She longed to be able to look beautiful but keep that relationship to beauty sacred with herself, her body, and all other women. She wasn't even sure there could be a way to do such a thing, but she wanted to try nonetheless.

And that was the challenge of beautiful things: they were beautiful, and Stella craved beauty in every sense. While she watched other women at work show up in progressively drabber clothing, she loved wearing her silk shirts. She loved knowing about makeup, wearing coral blush that looked too bright for her in the palette but perfect on her skin, washing her beautiful brushes, allowing herself the daily worship that was putting fine creams on her skin. It wasn't men she sought to please, not even women either; she sought out the feeling of beauty, of power within that look, of walking into a room and making the mood within it shift. Though she wanted to be attractive, she wanted more to feel attractive, to feel womanly in whatever definition of that word she chose, to have the outward presentation of her matched who she felt she was inside. She wanted to wear silk shirts. She wanted healthy hair and muscles that showed that she swam this morning. She wanted to convey authority, autonomy, ecstasy, every contradiction that she found made her a woman. She wanted to feel the lace of a thong beneath her dress-trousers at work. She wanted to peel off her bra at the end of the day and eat a slice of cheesecake in bed, her skirt still on but her shirt having been shed, her heels falling off because of the position at which she crossed her ankles. If a man ever found her threatening, she would be proud. If a man ever found her unattractive, she would laugh. What she wanted was to feel that she herself was attractive, that who she was was someone worth being, and it was shocking to find that a thirty-dollar tube of mascara let her do that just a little bit every day. It wasn't enough, certainly not, but it was something. On days when she couldn't do her job, it meant that there was still a way to honor herself.

While Bedelia was in a fitting room, while Stella noticed that the store they were in lacked price tags altogether, Stella found herself coming back to one specific bag on display, held by an artistic glass case meant to not look like a glass case. The black calfskin leather looked soft, absolutely breathtaking, and though the style of the bag was a little eccentric, the bag held a classic air, like an heirloom, like plates brought out only for Christmas. Staring down at her own handbag, Stella saw how old hers had grown, counted back eight years to when she had first purchased it. Though she liked classic pieces like her own bag, and though she owned other bags she could potentially use instead, she preferred the normalcy of just one, the lack of excess. While people like Bedelia packed multiple suitcases for a vacation, Stella liked that she could pack little because of the quality of her clothes, liked that the wearability of one good handbag meant it would coordinate with any outfit. She didn't _need_  to replace this bag, but looking at the enclosed one, she wanted to replace it, to request the price on this new bag and do the mental maths in order to see if it could possibly fit her budget. With her Belfast income, she could afford something beautiful, and somehow, it seemed fitting to blow every cent she'd made on the case on a single handbag. Still, she wasn't sure that all she'd been paid for Belfast could cover the cost of such an item anyway. She didn't normally shop in places that lacked price tags.

"Do you like it?" her sister had said, making Stella flinch with surprise. "Black for this season. Atypical."

Looking back at her sister, Stella saw nonchalance in Bedelia's visage. At the checkout, employees were putting two dresses in proper bags for Bedelia, penciling in an address for shipping. Stella guessed that, when Bedelia went to pay at least a thousand for what she'd chosen, her same foreign credit card would still go through. 

"Calfskin is superior," Bedelia gave, as if they were talking about something as benign and normal as paint colors for the outside of a house, "and the quality here is unparalleled. My Italian leather hardly holds up as well. If they still carried boots, I would find you a pair to try."

Boots? The shop smelled of men's cologne. All of the employees looked vaguely the same, regardless of gender. The fur rugs on the floor seemed as if they were made of real fur. Stella didn't want a pair of boots from here.

"No," she gave, looking away from the cased bag, "I was just looking."

"It's no bother," Bedelia said. "They'll take it out for you. If you have any qualms about quality, they're more than happy to assist and reimburse."

So Bedelia owned a bag like this. Of course she did. She probably owned twenty.

"Really," Stella insisted, face flushing with discomfort, "I was just-"

Silently, Bedelia made a signal, a single turn of the head that alerted the employees to her wants. In seconds, someone was coming over to help them, taking out a pocketed key and opening the avant-garde case, presenting the bag to the two sisters. The employee went on about the classic model, the fine calfskin and the different coloring for this season, how this bag was classic enough to be a staple but new and youthful enough to make a statement; there were spare, discreet pockets inside, places where Stella could picture her lipstick, her pool pass, mixed nuts for when she was inevitably hungry, a compact mirror, face powder. Somehow, the bag could fit more than it seemed it would, so there was plenty of space for things like letters to mail, the lining made of gorgeous reinforced silk. Apparently, mothers tended to love this model, for it had enough space for both their _mom supplies_  and their _me supplies_. 

And then, the reality set in: this bag would be insured and kept on an international registry. In cases of theft, the original owner is registered within this company, so reimbursement and replacement are guaranteed. If there is any reason to doubt the quality of this handbag, the company can fix or replace the bag with no additional cost. It is recommended that the lining be replaced every three years, the stitching checked every five. The price? Not one thousand, not two, not even five, but ten. Ten-thousand dollars. Though Stella knew that her currency was more valuable than American dollars, ten-thousand dollars was still too much. Even if the leather felt luxurious, even if she could already picture herself carrying this bag, ten-thousand dollars was far, _far_  outside of her price range. 

"Fantastic," Bedelia said, giving a tight-lipped smile. "Thank you."

And, to Stella's shock, the employee carried the bag toward the checkout, started talking about the registry forms while Bedelia heeled him. Disconcerted, Stella followed along, watched as the bag was expertly wrapped in tissue, brought into a classy shopping bag, rung up in all its expensive glory. When the employee asked if Bedelia would prefer to pay in-full or in installments, Bedelia said in-full without hesitation. Taking out her same credit card, she tapped the plastic against the counter, not anxiously but with a strange aloofness. While Stella felt she could barely breathe, Bedelia was about to drop ten thousand dollars on a handbag. Still, the greatest shock was when Bedelia moments later slid the registration paperwork toward Stella, telling her to list her own name and address. Bedelia wasn't purchasing this for herself; she was purchasing it for Stella. Without batting an eyelash, she was spending ten thousand dollars on a bag for Stella.

"Shouldn't we talk about this?" Stella whispered to her sister while Bedelia swiped her credit card.

"You did like it, didn't you?" Bedelia gave indifferently.

"Yes, but...."

They were gone from the shop before Stella could elaborate, Bedelia's bagged dresses being shipped to her home after the proper alterations were done, Bedelia insisting that Stella carry the new bag. Now, Stella looked down at the shopping bag as Bedelia kept walking, had an uncomfortably blank mind from the purchases that had just been made but found herself thinking so clearly that she wanted ice cream. She just wanted ice cream. Though she couldn't begin to fathom what she held in a shopping bag right now, she knew that she wanted ice cream, and she wanted to have it with her sister.

"Bedelia?" she called, still standing in front of the open doors, still taking in the cold from the air conditioning. 

Gracefully, Bedelia turned around, looked back at Stella, gave a look of indifference.

"Can we stop for gelato?" Stella asked. "My treat."

But it wouldn't be her treat, for she didn't have any local currency, and acting as if gelato was a treat after her sister had just purchased-

"Fine," Bedelia gave, walking back to meet Stella, breezing past her sister as she went into the shop. 

At the marble counter, Bedelia asked a working teenager for a small cup of honey gelato, her sunglasses still on as she spoke; she looked toward Stella with a dry expression, asking for her order as if her order were the greatest of inconveniences. Because the mint had looked so fresh, Stella asked for a large cup of it, then insisted, _a large for hers too, make hers a large._  From behind the sunglasses, Bedelia couldn't show an eye-roll, so Stella mentally filled one in.

"You are an excessive person," Bedelia said as she took her cup from the counter, a tip of ten dollars left in the jar. Stella hadn't thought Bedelia would keep cash.

With her own cup in hand, Stella followed as Bedelia took to a table at the front of the shop, right by the long windows. When Bedelia sat down, she crossed her legs with a practiced elegance, left her sunglasses on the table as if they were a negligible expense. What wasn't a negligible expense to her? Stella could remember going days without eating, stealing sheets from a hookup's apartment because she couldn't afford her own. Even though she was comfortable now, she didn't know if she could ever expend so much money on a handbag after seeing what that kind of money could offer someone less fortunate. 

"You didn't have to pay for that," Stella gave quietly, uncomfortably. There were other people in this shop who wouldn't bat an eyelash at such a nonexistent price tag; she didn't want to reveal herself as different from them. "Really. I feel...."

Letting the sentence fade away, she looked down at the shopping bag, at the calfskin inside. Though it was beautiful and well-made, something that would blend perfectly into Stella's closet, it was still merely a handbag. A handbag she would be reluctant to give up, but a handbag nonetheless. Had she been paying herself, she wouldn't have dared humor a bag of such a price. 

Bedelia looked up from her gelato, one eyebrow raised, and gave, "You need to learn how to accept a gift."

"It's not a _gift,_ " Stella stressed, trying but failing to keep her tone a whisper. "It's...the price of a car. A semester's tuition, at least."

"You live in a city. You don't need a car."

Involuntarily, Stella huffed a laugh, staring incredulously at her sister and then having her look turn to one of horror as she realized that Bedelia hadn't been joking. Trying to make words, Stella agonized over a point, a reason why she couldn't accept this handout, some way to refuse it and therefore keep her wealth within areas of her life that didn't require an international registry of similar bags. A home, she could understand, somewhere that her nonexistent heirs could live in the future, but a handbag? And what kind of woman gifted such an expensive handbag? What kind of woman gifted such a thing to an estranged sister as retail therapy after their mother died?

Then, the idea came to Stella, and though she knew she ought to be angry, she wasn't.

"I won't be receiving an inheritance," Stella said, the statement imperative, no question in her tone.

With her little spoon, Bedelia made patterns in her ice cream, gracefully drawing a twisting river through the cup. She stared down as if looking away from Stella could deflect the discomfort that the rest of her body language reflected.

"I allowed her to make the financial decisions," Bedelia gave, a concession and confession combined. "I acted merely as a witness."

"Oh, autonomy," Stella said sarcastically, nodding to herself at what was. Though she hadn't expected an inheritance, the meaning behind receiving nothing outweighed what even the smallest monetary contribution could represent. Years ago, she'd stopped judging herself based on the love she'd never received from her mother, but it was an exhausting, disconcerting revelation to find that the closest thing she would ever receive to love would be an expensive handbag gifted out of pity by her sister. 

Stella wanted to be enraged. She wanted this to feel like an earth-shattering betrayal, like a major point in her life's story, like something to spend multiple sessions - maybe even months - working through with her therapist, but somehow, she found herself indifferent. Though she couldn't think of positives yet, the benefits of never owing anything to her mother in life or death, she still found herself mostly unfazed. Even if the revelation was uncomfortable, even if the meaning behind such a thing had taken her momentarily by surprise, she now found that she could think the statement over and over again without feeling the pain of its reality. _My mother did not love me. My mother did not love me. My name is Stella Gibson. I am forty-three years old. I live in London. My mother did not love me. I'm hoping we'll have steak for dinner. I think my sister could cook a lovely steak. I won't tell her, but I'm still thinking about the ramen from last night. I think, somehow, in the cracks of what is and has been, I am finding a way to love her. Not love her in the past, but love her now. It is painful to feel much of anything toward her. She doesn't make this easy. But I see her now. I see that what I once noticed about her was all true. The discomfort, the underlying emotion, I wasn't wrong when I saw those things. I could see through her in so many ways. I still can. I can understand why such a thing would be disconcerting. Her shoulders are tensed, but she doesn't want them to be. If I hadn't been to therapy for anxiety before, I wouldn't know the pattern at which she is counting her breaths. I'm going to choose to think she wanted me to receive something, if not for my own sake then for hers. Maybe I forgive her. Maybe there was never anything to forgive. Maybe I only knew a version of her bound to our mother. Maybe I only saw the parts of her that she didn't want anyone to see._

"It's alright," Stella gave, not sure what else to say. "I didn't expect to receive anything."

Bedelia nodded, still not meeting Stella's gaze, still failing to look aloof. 

"It's a kind gift," Stella continued, not looking to aggravate but still hoping for a reaction. "Excessive, but kind."

Glancing up at Stella, then looking back down at her spoon, Bedelia said, "At least you're learning."

For a while, neither of them spoke, instead taking to their own individual cups and sitting with their own individual thoughts. Because of the air conditioning, the gelato stayed cool and didn't melt, and the mint flavor was perfectly fresh and creamy, a nice treat in wake of their last few days. When they were girls, they used to share ice cream cones, a standard vanilla-chocolate swirl bought at the beach, and though Stella didn't feel that this shared gelato was reminiscent of those times as girls, she was nonetheless thankful to share ice cream with her sister again. She wondered if Bedelia even remembered going to the beach together.

"There are things I want to ask you," Stella gave, letting out a breath as she spoke. Unfortunately, there was something addictive about vulnerability, about how the consequences were never as painful as she expected them to be. "Other things. Important things."

"Such as?"

Bedelia looked up at her, meeting Stella's gaze intently and communicating clearly that further questions should be deferred, silenced, or forgotten. Though Stella had only a few times seen such a side of her sister before, there was something so natural about it, so expected; even if she had never seen Bedelia manipulate a conversation without doing much of anything at all before, she could see the progression so easily, the change. If there was anything Bedelia knew how to do, it was to adapt to her surroundings with grace, but that adaptation would never come without a fight first. 

Trying to find a topic, something benign but still relevant, Stella reached for, "Your health history. Whether or not we have certain things in common."

"I'm sure you can access my health history," Bedelia gave. "Information is freely available. You're bound to have clearance." 

"Your personal history," Stella tried. "The things I've missed. The ones that I can't ignore."

Bedelia looked down and raised both eyebrows, giving a look of superiority and annoyance. 

"I feel as if we owe each other the basics," Stella gave. "At least."

"I don't want to owe you anything."

"Do you feel you owe me anything?" Stella asked. "Or do you just not want to feel that way?"

" _Stop._ "

So Stella quieted, eyes back on her own cup, trying to think of how to tie up loose ends. Still, what ends were loose between them? Their parents were dead, leaving the two sisters as the last of the bloodline. As much as it pained Stella to think, she knew that she herself would never have children, and it was clear that Bedelia would never be a mother either. What else could they possibly owe each other? What else could they work through? There was no real closure with an estranged sister, not after this many years apart, not after the self-made separations between them. Though Stella wanted to bridge gaps, she found that those gaps had little desire to be bridged, that some things were better left unspoken. There was an undeniable possibility that deeper conversation between Bedelia and herself could result in nothing but more pain for each of them. Still, Stella thought that there would always be a nagging guilt if she left this country without closure. She would always wonder what was happening in Bedelia's life, would always yearn for just a bit of closeness even if that closeness proved too painful to sustain. After so much time apart, Stella couldn't just leave and pretend that Bedelia was dead too, and even if Bedelia were to die, her death would never make Stella less of a sister. The painful reality of having a sibling was that, once someone had one, they could never _not_  have a sibling; instead, they would always be one of two, one of three, one of however many, and they would never truly be alone in this portion of their lives. Even a dead sibling would be a _dead sibling,_  not an _unsibling,_ not someone who changed the surviving sibling's status _._  No matter how much separation was between Stella and Bedelia, they would still be sisters. Though it felt naive to think so, Stella thought that there should be some kind of sacredness in that relationship. If they really were meant to never speak again, that message should at least be clear and concise. There shouldn't be any reason to have doubts now.

"You said you would book me a ticket home," Stella gave, tone more neutral; she wasn't looking for a fight. "Have you?"

Bedelia looked up at her with an indifference that Stella was coming to despise. 

"I had my agent book your return," Bedelia said. "You're checked in, by the way. I have a driver scheduled to take you to the airport."

"When?" 

"The evening of the day after the funeral."

Stella nodded, mentally mapping out when she would be expected to return to work. Though she couldn't quite remember the rule, she thought it was something like one day of discomfort for every one hour of time change. She'd always hated jet lag.

"By then," Stella said, "I want answers."

"To which questions exactly?" Bedelia sounded exhausted.

"I'm not sure. I don't know what you'll be willing to answer."

"So why do you want such answers, then?"

"Because I'm leaving you."

Bedelia furrowed her eyebrows as if wincing. 

 


	23. Interlude: Your Tucked-Away Boxes

The flat had been a force of nature, a near-magic space within the too-old, too-tired, too-rainy city, the refuge Stella found at the end of long class days during which she learned about people whose societies were built on such a sensation of comfort. When Stella put her key into the lock, slid metal against metal, she felt what she imagined was the carry-over of her ancestors' cultures, the beliefs and patterns of the women who came before her; Jo taught her knife skills, how to properly chop a tomato or an onion, the ways to brown butter and sear steak, and as Stella moved her knife over the cutting board, as neither of them weighed ingredients or followed a recipe, Stella could feel the humanity of such an act, the sacredness of feeding oneself. Maybe it was the therapy, or maybe it was the anthropology, but there was something about that flat that carried with it a notion of the greatest safety. Though she'd had terrors in that place, though she'd woken plenty of times with nightmares and though she'd experienced enough flashbacks that she now had a bedside journal full of them, she could open the front door, close it behind her, and lock it in order to feel transformation. There was a horrific sanctity within those walls, how the art was mismatched and how the couch had seen better days. Cast-iron pans left on the stove, a kettle always waiting to be boiled, chamomile tea in the cabinets because Jo had insomnia. They had accumulated a few more tapes from sales at used bookstores. By the door, they left sandals and trainers. Recently, Stella's therapist had recommended exercise, so she and Jo would lace up in the mornings before Jo went to work, before Stella went to class. Now that the semester was almost over, Stella would be working in the archives at her university, shadowing a tenured professor and spending her days among stacks of books. She could only imagine the bliss of going from one quiet, safe place, then to the tube, then to another. 

And when they cleaned, belated spring-cleaning right after Stella returned from the United States for Bedelia's graduation, Jo found an old journal and pieced through it while Stella dusted the dresser. That was what Stella liked most about cleaning; there was a history to this flat, a chronology of relationships lost. When Jo's dry-cleaning was dropped off - Thursdays, in between Stella's classes, Stella had to get it because Jo was at work - Stella liked being able to look at the shirts inside of the cleaners' bag, to feel the silk between her fingers and know that this woman had a life totally external to Stella's. They were both piecing themselves back together in their own way. It was comforting to know that they were helping each other even just through lying side-by-side at night, talking for a few minutes before turning out the light, telling each other things that they wouldn't tell anyone else. Jo was thinking about going out for a drink with a woman she met; Stella encouraged her to do so if she was ready. Back when Stella had first been presented with the job in the archives, Jo had offered to swing by for lunch if Stella ended up feeling lonely. Maybe that was the magic of it all, the reassurance that they each had someone to be with; when Stella wanted to spend the weekend at the British Museum, she knew without asking that Jo would want to go too, and when one of them spent the night out - Stella at research presentations for her department, Jo at a bar with friends - they came home to an _I missed you_  followed by a _want to go down the street and get ice cream?_  Though they had expectations of each other, those expectations were warm ones, ones founded on love and care. When outsiders who didn't know them asked, Jo and Stella referred to each other as sisters. It simply seemed right.

Looking at the journal, Jo huffed a near-bittersweet laugh, said, "I found my bucket list."

Stella looked up from where she was dusting in the bedroom, craned her neck to try to read the text.

"What's on it?" Stella asked.

"Marry," Jo gave, "which is very fun to read and _very_  improbable."

"It doesn't have to be legal to be real."

"Yes, but this was from my...angrier days," Jo said, laughing lightly. "I think I was planning on storming Parliament or something. Which, of course, wouldn't have helped my cause in the least."

"What else is there?"

"I wanted to run the Marathon here," Jo said, "but-"

"You hate running," Stella said, thinking of how she had to drag Jo out of bed each morning they went, how Jo couldn't lace her sneakers without pouting. "You _hate_  running."

"The route's pretty."

"You _hate_  running!"

"I wanted to go to Italy and swim in the sea there," Jo said. "Funnily enough, I didn't specify which sea."

"The strait?" 

"It would be ironic, wouldn't it?"

"There are beautiful islands there," Stella said. "My father used to show me pictures."

"Do you still have them?"

Stella nodded, then took to the closet, found the two cardboard boxes that represented her life before this place. Pulling apart the flaps, she dug through the jewelry, some of Daddy's old sweaters, his pipe, Bedelia's copy of _Misty of Chincoteague_  that had been left behind right before the house was sold; her savings were impractical, fairly worthless to much of anyone else, but she liked knowing that these two boxes were tucked away, kept safe. She liked having a few things that she considered of the utmost importance but that anyone else would write off in an instant. 

She kept the photographs in an album in hope of preserving her only copies. Before the move, she'd taken her parents' wedding pictures - few and far between, and very clearly left behind by her mother - and her father's records, pieces of paper that bore his signature. In the back of the album, she had pictures of him from before she was born, all in black-and-white and fading at the edges. She pulled out one photograph of him with two other men sitting by the sea, the sparkling water rendered beautifully despite the age of the camera, his shirtsleeves rolled up and his pants cuffed and holding a dampness characteristic of the ocean. He was the only one of the men who looked as if he'd taken a dip. 

Turning over the photograph, she saw his handwriting in black ink on the back, written as _Capri, 1965._  He would've been so young then. Within a year, he would be married, and Bedelia would be born in 1967, Stella in 1969. Before his daughters were out of their teenage years, he would be dead. From that photograph onward, his life would largely consist of borrowed time. It was strange, she thought, how death could make ominous the most benign of pasts.

"Here," Stella said, passing the photograph toward Jo. "Capri. He spent holidays there before he married my mother."

Taking the photograph in her open hand, Jo held the piece gently, as if it were as valuable as Stella believed it to be. Jo looked to Stella, asked, "Did he have your eyes?"

"My eyes?"

"You know, the same color."

Looking back down at the picture, Stella tried to put color to this image of her father, and maybe he _did_  have the same eyes as she did. She hadn't spent much time comparing theirs, but she could remember the way he would look at her, wide smile on his face and his eyes so warm, so blue, so endless and sensitive. No matter what could happen in her life, no one would know her as well as her father had, how he felt her sensitivity as if it were his own, how he could predict her emotions before she even felt them. Losing him had been like losing an arm or leg for her. Now, she felt loss in a way that she knew she would never really recover from; her best bet, she knew, was to simply learn to live with the absence, but if she could, if she had the power, she would pull him from his grave and ask him to come back. _Please,_  she would beg, _I just want to know if we have the same eyes._

"Maybe," she said, and Jo nodded, understanding what it meant to forget, understanding how that could hurt in an unpreventable way.

"You have a break, don't you?" Jo asked. "The switch of semesters. You have a week, yes?"

"Yes, two from now," Stella said, nodding. 

"No work?"

Stella hummed an affirmative.

"We should go," Jo said, pointing down at the photograph, "right here."

Laughing humorlessly, Stella gave, "Impulsive."

"I need to take vacation," Jo said, nodding. "I have days. Plus, we both need some sun."

"I was just out of the country."

"Yes, but that was different," Jo said, looking down at the photograph, "for I wasn't there, and your sister was. And it's not a holiday if it's stressful."

Stella conceded to that point, nodded once. 

"No sisters graduating," Jo said, trying to entice Stella, "just us and the sea. We'll stay on the island, just like that."

"I don't have the money."

"Yes, and you neglected to tell me when your birthday was," Jo scolded with a smile, knowing this was an argument she would win, "so consider this a belated present."

It wasn't belated by much, only by two months, but Stella could remember when they updated Stella's passport together so that Stella could travel to Bedelia's graduation, how Jo's face had fallen upon seeing the date on Stella's birth certificate. _I missed your birthday,_  Jo had said, as if she were recounted a time when she was purposefully hurtful toward Stella. The rest of the day, Jo had apologized, said she should've known, asked Stella if there was anything she wanted to have, see, or do, but Stella hadn't wanted anything. Still, she wished Jo didn't know when her birthday was, for such information felt so intimate and private, and that felt like the proper thing to hold back. After that day, however, they both knew each other's birthdays, and because Jo's was in October, Stella had yet to think of a gift, but she knew she wouldn't miss it, would try to make it feel special in some way. _Do I even have the power to make it special?_  she wondered, but after seeing how distraught Jo was over missing Stella's birthday, Stella knew that, even if she didn't feel that she had much power over others, she did have the power to make Jo feel something. And she knew she could use that power for good things as well as bad.

"Alright," Stella conceded, "but-"

"Start packing!" Jo passed the photograph gingerly back to Stella. "Have you got a swimsuit? If not, we're going out for one. Or two! Let's get two."

"I don't need two," Stella said, shaking her head.

"You know what else was on that stupid list of mine?" Jo asked. "Swim the English channel. Crazy."

"Do you actually want to do that?"

"I think I did," Jo said, "but I wanted to run the Marathon too, and-"

"You hate running!"

Jo laughed and shook her head, then started back toward the cleaning, to unpacking more things and reorganizing what they could. 

A week later, they were on the train to the airport, sharing one suitcase because the trip would be warm and short; they had their tickets at the ready, and as they walked through the airport, Stella felt the memorial pull of having been here just a few weeks ago, leaving for the United States and then coming back to find Jo waiting for her, smiling all wide when Stella came through the arrivals area, holding open her arms for a hug. It hadn't been a long time spent away, but it had been long enough for them both to miss each other, and on the train home, Stella had plenty of stories to tell Jo about Bedelia's life in America, her sister's strange boyfriend and his rich family, the sister-in-law Stella might gain from a marriage, the way their mother had watched with indifference as Bedelia was declared to be graduating with highest honors. Bedelia was about to start medical school at a reputable university, and all the while, their mother didn't care, likely didn't even understand what that meant. The boyfriend's parents, however, were over the moon, and they loved _Bea_  as if she were their own, and they kept her in riches, pearls around her neck, fancy dresses hung up for social events in the bedroom she and the boyfriend shared. At one point, Stella caught Bedelia and Greg, the boyfriend, smoking cigarettes on the balcony of his bedroom together, the two awake early and using a fancy dish as an ashtray; it had been comforting, Stella thought, to see her sister as more human in that instance, more prone to failure. Bedelia could so easily become a caricature, so it was refreshing to watch Bedelia breathe out smoke instead of pure air, to see Bedelia push the cigarette down into the bowl, to marvel at Greg lighting her another one. She liked that Bedelia must've seen cancerous lungs in anatomy labs but still smoked anyway.

The flight to Naples was only three hours; the ferry ride would be half an hour, maybe longer. As they sat alongside each other on the plane, Jo and Stella kept their respective books in the seatback compartments, one copy a Joan Didion book and the other _The Secret Garden._  Stella loved how when traveling with Jo they would midway through whatever trip they were on swap books, leaving two separate bookmarks in each copy, talking about what they read as they walked around whatever new destination they found themselves in. For the future, Stella would remember that Jo liked the aisle seat on a plane. When the flight attendants began to go through the safety features presentation, Jo asked Stella if she knew any Italian, which Stella didn't.

"I know one phrase," Jo said, then scrunched up her face in an attempt to perform proper pronunciation. " _Ciao, posso offrirti qualcosa de bere?_ "

"And what does that mean?" Stella asked.

"Can I buy you a drink?" Jo said, laughing. "Extremely useful."

"Yes, _so_  useful," Stella said. "As useful as the word /bathroom/ or even the world _help._ "

"It's more than _you_ know," Jo said, playfully nudging Stella's foot. 

Outside, the day was cloudy, but by the time they touched down in Italy, Stella knew it would be sunny, and that the little flat they were renting would have a lemon tree outside, and that they would be able to climb to the top of the island, then look down at the bright blue ocean so unlike the one closest to their home. She wanted to pick lemons from a tree, mix them with tap water, and bring Jo a glass in the morning. She wanted to dive beneath the waves of the ocean like she once did with her father and with Bedelia too. He taught them both how to swim during off-hours at the pool in his men's club while they were all much younger, and he would tell them to go beneath the water, to let the air out of their lungs, to lie back and look up and sink to the very bottom. _In the ocean,_  he would say, _doing this means you get to feel the waves, to see everything. You can see how big the world is, how intricate the sea is, how high above us the sky continues to be. Isn't it beautiful? I think that's where I would like to stay forever, if my lungs could cope with such a thing. I would stay on my back on the ocean floor, looking up at the sky, feeling how the waves move me back and forth. That's where I would like to stay forever._

The captain announced over the loudspeaker when they were passing over the channel, so Stella reached over to Jo, pointed out the window, asked, "You would want to swim that?"

Jo shrugged and before going back to her book said, "Why not?"

Until the view was clouded, Stella looked down at the ocean and thought of those two words, _why not?_


	24. Interlude: Then, A Miracle

While lifeguarding, Bedelia wasn't supposed to read, but oftentimes, she did anyway, sneaking in her psychology textbook to the pool, dressing in red and hoping that no one would notice she was studying. The early morning hours after swim practices were sparse; luckily, she could stay after practice, change into the proper lifeguarding clothes, and stick around for another few hours. Typically, only older faculty members of her university would come by to swim, so Bedelia didn't have to pay much attention, rarely had to intervene in the way that those who had later shifts, those attached to open swim hours that Bedelia herself heavily associated with alcohol consumption and, though it could go without saying, stupidity, needed to. No one would question her textbook, and no one would need her. Oftentimes, it was the most relaxing part of her day.

That morning, Coach had forced her to up the weight in her shoulder exercises, and now, she was taking deep breaths, trying to spread the pain out, hoping that this would all just be temporary. A year and a half after her first surgery, eight months after her second, she still wasn't in the pool, and although Coach and the rest of the team had been sweet about it, had prioritized her as a person over her as an athlete, she still knew that she was the team's deadweight, that it was practically idiotic for her to travel to every meet with the athletes who would actually be swimming, that there was no use in tagging along for any of the practices in which she wouldn't take part. Nonetheless, she still had a spot on the team, and in the interim, she could take lifeguard shifts, getting money for candy bars from the newsstand next to her dormitory because Coach had a strict rule against alcohol but she still wanted _something_  to indulge in. Even if she rarely was in the pool, she was still nearby, as close as she could be to actually being inside without ever getting wet. She knew it was better than nothing, even if it all sometimes felt like nothing.

She popped a Queen tape into the Walkman Margaret had given her years before, one that was starting to show its age, scratches forming around the outside, the headphone jack becoming temperamental. Once she was at the proper song, she put on her headphones, leaned back in the uncomfortable lifeguard's chair, popped open her textbook, began to read the chapter on schizophrenia. Though she was pre-medical, she was beginning to despise chemistry, liked physics more but preferred biology overall, liked that psychology was scientific but not at all scientific. In a month, she would be finishing her third semester at New York University, and so far, her academics were better than she'd expected. For once, her grades were in her control, thanks mostly to Coach.

 _You know,_  he'd told her while she'd done homework as other girls on the team swam, _it's nice to have a dyslexic athlete. You guys don't sweat the small stuff._

 _Dyslexic?_  Bedelia had questioned, not knowing what the word meant.

 _Yeah,_  he'd said, pointing at the colored films on her textbook, the tattered old ones that Margaret had given her. Had she known how to replicate or replace the films, she would've done so by now. _I don't know what it is. Maybe people like you just don't mind the clock. I'm not really educated about it, don't have a learning disability myself._

 _I don't have a learning disability,_  Bedelia had said, shaking her head, unsure of what he meant. _I just read better with these._

And after two sessions with some kind of doctor, one whose role Bedelia didn't quite understand, she was given a concrete diagnosis, a reason as to why she hadn't been able to read French for so many years. For two hours a week, she now worked with a tutor who taught her how to make the pages in front of her make sense, who spoke to her professors so that she could have extra time on exams, who replaced the films with new ones, who taught her what to do so that she wouldn't have to use the films anymore. 

At the pool, she saw motion in front of her, so she looked up from her textbook to see a boy, clearly a student, tall and asking her questions. Like everyone else in the pool, he wore a proper cap, but unlike the others, he wore the sparse swimsuit of a dedicated swimmer, not the more comfortable trunks, not even a pair of tight shorts like the crew team wore. He was tanned and muscular, icy blue eyes and overgrown brows, the freckles on his cheeks making him somehow look more mature. As "Radio Ga Ga" played, she looked down at him, watched as he shifted weight into one hip, eyed the movement it caused within his swimsuit. Then, shaking herself from the moment, she pulled her headphones off, tried to hear what he was saying.

"What?" she asked, flustered. 

Looking up, he smiled, lips dry, a little taken with her. She blushed uncomfortably, wanted him to go away.

"I was just asking where the kickboards are," he gave, looking around. "They're not in their usual spot."

No, because the girls on the swim team had used them this morning, so the boards had relocated from one pool to another. 

"They're going to be toward the women's locker room," Bedelia said, sounding awkward. 

"New spot?" he asked.

"Temporary," she gave.

He nodded in thanks, but before he could step away, he asked, "What're you listening to?"

She furrowed her brow, asked, "Why do you want to know?" 

Shrugging, he gave, "Just a question."

She looked down at her Walkman as if it were a foreign object, completely detached from her. Without thinking, she turned up the volume as high as it would go, making the song just loud enough to hear from afar through the headphones. Looking up at him, she watched as he furrowed his brow, figured out what it was, nodded in approval. 

"They were so good live." He slipped his goggles off of the top of his head, pulled off his cap to reveal short blonde hair. With his open hand, he reached out to shake hers. "I'm Greg."

Her hand was limp and awkward as she shook his, going to say her name but then pausing before she could speak.

"Bea," he said, reading off the nametag on her uniform. The pool staff had told her that _Bedelia_  was too long and hard to pronounce, did she have a nickname? "It's nice to meet you, Bea."

Pulling her hand back, Bedelia gave, "Nice to meet you too."

"You're on the team, right?" Greg asked, hands moving to his hips. There was something so strange about men's hips, how small they could be. In high school, Bedelia had seen the puckering of women's hips, the cellulite and the rotundness, the way everything grew a little wider with age; in comparison, the boys she'd seen unclothed - just without shirts - were tiny and narrow, as if they weren't properly formed. She didn't understand how all of the proper organs could fit in such a confined space, or maybe that was why they had-

"Yeah," Bedelia forced out, almost choking on the word. "Yeah, I'm...benched."

"Benched?"

"Shoulder injury."

"Redshirt?"

"I was," she gave. "Last year."

"Me too," he said, nodding. "But it was my knee, not my shoulder. So typical."

Furrowing her brow, not sure why she didn't recognize him, she asked, "But you're swimming for us now?"

"Oh, no," Greg gave, "I quit the team after a year. Didn't really see the point."

"Why not?"

He shrugged. "Massive time commitment. I don't want to go professional. You know."

Though she didn't know, she nodded anyway. 

"What kind of injury was it?" he asked. 

Again, she furrowed her brow, was unsure of the question; seeing her confusion, he qualified, "Like, with surgeries and such. I want to be a surgeon. Sorry, I don't mean to pry."

"Rotator cuff tear," Bedelia gave. "Two tendons, five centimeters."

" _Shit,_ " he said, palm going to his forehead to brace himself. "Fuck. That's...holy shit."

"Yeah," she said awkwardly.

Two surgeries and many months later, she was still inept. Even physical therapy was a challenge sometimes. Though she could still get that same high from the stationary bike, she was sick of pedaling all in one direction, going nowhere. Now, the shock of no longer being able to swim had worn off, and what was left in its wake was the discomfort of having to move on from that tragedy. While those who were grieving could take time to process what they felt, the last thing Bedelia needed was more time to internalize the truth; instead, she needed something better, something new, something else to work toward, but she didn't want to figure out who she was without swimming, didn't want to pursue other things, wanted to return to her dormitory each night feeling near tears because she couldn't swim and wanted that to be her daily ritual. She didn't want pain she couldn't understand. Two tendons, five centimeters. She didn't want pain that couldn't be qualified in four simple words.

"Well, you're hardcore for going with it anyway," he said, nodding to her. It was strange, how serious a look he gave her, as if he could actually feel some part of her pain. "My A.C.L. tore, and I didn't even last a year on the team. And here you are, still working for it. That takes...I mean, it takes a lot."

"Yeah," she said, looking down and not knowing what to say. "Thanks."

"Well." He nodded to her awkwardly, inelegantly, as if he'd just realized that he was nearly naked in front of her and talking about her insides. "Good to meet you."

And he was off to get a kickboard, and despite herself, she watched him walk away, the shift of his masculine hips so foreign to her. She'd seen Mathilde without pants on plenty of times, but Mathilde was different, more languid, more weighty; in comparison, this boy was slender and muscular, practical, anything but indulgent. When it came to swimmer boys, she saw them mostly as a group who ate steamed chicken on pasta, who got into arguments with coaches, who got angry with ease, and though Greg clearly looked as if he was on a steamed chicken diet, there was something more interesting about him, something less angry. On the back of one of his calves, he had a tattoo of a cross, and it looked almost ugly, all stark and black on his pale leg, but it was a tattoo, and she didn't know many people with tattoos. Looking at his, she almost wanted one of her own, something on the back of her shoulder, something that wasn't a scar. 

She watched when he dove back into the pool, throwing the kickboard in first and chasing after it, working his legs, wearing a neoprene sleeve around his knee. So, that was what rehabilitating an injury looked like while not on the team anymore. When he stopped at the end of the lane after a few laps, she noticed that he was smiling. She couldn't remember the last time she'd smiled at a pool, near a pool, in the gym, on the stationary bike, while talking to her coach, while talking to her doctors.

Going into her shift a few days later, she hoped she would see him, but no matter how much she stared at the door to the men's locker room, no matter how much she crossed her fingers and toes in hope, he didn't show, so she slouched back in the lifeguard chair, ignored the textbook on her lap, switched out the tape in her Walkman and did the displeasure that was her job. By the time her shift was over, she clocked out with a scowl, annoyed with a boy and annoyed with herself. Eventually, she figured she would be one of those girls who dreamed of men's swimwear, memorizing the male anatomy in one of her textbooks, giggling over it with her friends and acting as if such a thing were the strangest and most elusive thing in the world, but she didn't have friends to giggle with, and even with the French porn magazines Mathilde had shown her, there had been only discomfort, no giggling. She didn't want to be a girl brought down by a boy, but at the same time, she'd been a girl already brought down by a girl, the correlation between her involvement with Mathilde and her uninvolvement with her own studies being incredibly significant. Even Margaret, who had wanted nothing to do with Bedelia for her whole final year of high school, had questioned the slip. Still, Bedelia had had someone to talk to, even if only for a few months; she liked kissing Mathilde after the initial shock of it wore off, and she liked the way they would share her bed, both of them half-naked and sleepy, talking about everything from Kant to shoelaces, complaining about dining hall food and girls with a sense of self-importance. She liked the skin of Mathilde's belly, how soft it was, and she liked when Mathilde left sweaters behind in her room. She liked the way Mathilde would flick cigarette ash out her window, the burning tip of the smoke bringing color to the bland Connecticut winter. She eventually liked how Mathilde could unhook her brassiere with one had, and eventually liked too when Mathilde would do that at unexpected times. 

It wasn't truly intimate, not in the way one would expect, and when years later certain presidents had certain affairs, Bedelia would question the extent of it, the proper name for what she and Mathilde had been, but still, it wasn't romantic. In some ways, it was everything but romantic; they kissed, and they held each other, and it made Bedelia feel good, but there was always a sense that her good feelings were deeper than Mathilde's could ever be, that anything she felt was beyond what Mathilde was capable of feeling. There was nothing comfortable about being the one who cared more, and she felt shame in that whenever Mathilde would dismiss her, going out to dances with boys, telling Bedelia that if a boy stuck his hand down her underwear it wasn't a big deal. But it _was_  a big deal. Only after Mathilde flew back to France did Bedelia realize what a big deal it was. During the weekdays, Bedelia was Mathilde's plaything, something to help her get through the day; weekends were reserved for real lovers, not ones sought out of desperation. When Mathilde had said it was alright that Bedelia didn't want to touch her in certain ways, the ways Mathilde had specifically asked for, Bedelia had thought it really was alright, but it wasn't in the end.

Still, she wouldn't call the leaving heartbreak, for she could think of much more heartbreaking things, but there was something horribly sad about loving someone who was unlovable, someone who could never love her back. Though she still felt the same way about other women, she didn't want to try again, felt due caution after Mathilde, so she hadn't dated during her first year of college. For a while, she thought she simply didn't like boys at all, for all the ones she saw were dull, incoherent, smelly, incompetent. She could see  the attractiveness of men on billboards or in movies, but they were nothing like the men around her, all of whom talked down to her even when they got worse exam grades than she did, all of whom seemed to shower only every other week. It was disconcerting, then, to be looking for a boy, a boy with muscles and blonde hair and big blue eyes, a boy so unlike Mathilde, a boy who was so much a _man._  Swallowing her pride as she left the pool area, as she changed out of her lifeguarding clothes, as she left the women's locker room, she admitted it to herself: she had a crush on this boy, a small, stupid, pointless, completely topical crush. She wanted to see him again to the point that she felt angry and annoyed with herself. _He wants to be a surgeon,_  she thought, _so he'll be in the medical classes. Maybe we'll run into each other in one of those buildings._

But on her way out of the gymnasium's building, she passed by the athletic training rooms, the sports laboratories, and through one of the long windows, she saw him, her boy, sitting on one of the examination tables, his sweatpants hiked up to expose his left leg. _Torn ligament,_  she remembered, and he was alone, and she walked slowly by, trying to see if he would notice, trying to remember if she had put on makeup today, not sure what she would even do if he saw her. But he did see her, and when their gazes met, he smiled softly at her, waved, motioned for her to come in. She opened the door to the room, came inside, left her back right next to his own. With the two bags next to each other, they made a picture, both of them using the company-sponsored sports team bags, both of theirs embroidered with their names, numbers, and teams, _Alderidge_  alongside _du Maurier._  

"Just getting off work?" he asked as she walked toward the table he sat on, his bad leg extended out. 

"Yeah," she gave, crossing her arms over her sweater. "Did something happen to your knee?"

He laughed under his breath, just to himself.

"I think I just strained it," he gave, nodding, "but still, I try to be extra careful about taking care of it when it hurts."

"Overuse?" 

"I was showing off," he said, "like an idiot."

Furrowing her brow, she asked, "What for? A tryout?"

He looked at her, seeming amused.

"I thought you were done with the teams and such," she said.

"How strict are you when it comes to being a swimmer?"

She gave him a confused look, said, "I'm on the team, even if I'm benched for right now."

"I mean," he specified, reaching into one of the pockets of his pants, "do you do the no sugar thing or not?"

In his hand, he had a Mars bar. She would go down to the convenience store near her dorm and get one of those whenever she had a big exam coming up; the bar would sit at the edge of her desk until she really needed it, and then, she would peel open the wrapper and eat it as if it were the most decadent thing in the world. She wanted to know if the chocolate was melted from its proximity to his body. 

He opened the bar up, tore off a piece, passed it to her.

"Thanks," she said, taking it, waiting until he had a piece for himself before having a bite. The chocolate left little warm prints behind on her fingers.

"So," he said, mouth full, "do you have a lot of tests this week? October is always a bitch."

"Not really," she gave. "Last week, though, there was a lot."

"At least we get a vacation soon."

"Yeah."

"Where're you heading for Thanksgiving?"

Last year, Bedelia spent Thanksgiving in the hospital, her appendix having been taken out in the hours prior. She wished she could relive that experience instead of having to spend a holiday alone in her dormitory or, worse, with her mother. 

"I don't really know," she gave. "Probably staying here."

He furrowed his brow, asked, "What about your parents?"

"My father is dead," she said. "I don't like being around my mother."

"Sorry to hear that."

"It's fine."

"Is your mother hard on you?"

"Yeah, I think so."

"Mine can get _so_  pushy," he gave, "but the good thing is that I have a younger sister, so my mom's been taking out her anger on my sister instead. Now, I'm not the one nagged anymore because I'm the one who's in college. My sister, though? Still in high school. My mom pushes _every_  activity she can onto her."

"Your mother cares about you both very much."

He seemed disconcerted for a moment but then said, "Yeah, I guess."

"Are you from around here?"

"Connecticut, yeah," he gave. "You?"

She weighed her words, said, "I live here now, but I used to live in England."

" _England?_ " he asked with surprise. "Then why don't you have an accent?"

"Trained myself out of it."

"Why would you do that?"

"To sound more American."

"Have you seen who our president is nowadays?" Greg asked, seeming to be joking. Bedelia couldn't remember who the president was. "The last kind of person you want to sound like is an American."

"Yeah," she gave, unsure.

He was quiet for a moment, tearing off another piece of the candy bar for her, passing it her way. Though she knew the candy would spoil lunch, she ate it anyway. She wished the bar were twice as long, for then she could stay here and keep talking to him for even longer.

"There's a meet for you this weekend, right?" he asked.

"Yeah, but I'm not swimming in it," she said. "Still benched."

"That's always the worst," he said. "Do you have to go along with the team?"

"I can if I want to."

"Do you want to?"

"What else could I do, just stay here?"

"I mean, yeah."

"That's boring."

He scoffed with a smile, gave, "This is New York. Nothing about it is boring."

"Then what do you suggest I do instead?"

"I don't know," he said. "Anything! Go to the Met. Get a burger."

"The Met?"

"Yeah, the Met."

"The baseball team?"

That made him genuinely laugh; he shook his head, said, "No, the Metropolitan Museum. The art museum."

"Oh."

"You _do_  know what a burger is," he said. "They must have those in England, right?"

"Yes, but I've never had one before."

" _Never?_ "

"No, never."

"Why not?"

"It's just meat on bread."

"And?"

"I don't know!" she said, realizing that she was smiling. "I feel no need to seek one out."

"Well, we're going to seek one out," he said, nodding. "Which residence are you in?"

She told him her building; he told her his. She wasn't sure why he was asking.

"Saturday, eleven in the morning," he said, "I'm getting you a burger, and then, we're going to the Met. Alright?"

Flustering, she tried not to blush at the prospect, tried to think of if she should go, then sobered, managed, "I don't have much money for-"

"Oh, don't worry about that," he said, brushing it off. "I'll pay."

"I can't let you-"

"It's really no big deal," he gave. "My dad loves the president. You know how it is."

She didn't know _how it is_  but nodded anyway.

"Thanks," she gave, unsure of what else to say.

"I'll pick you up."

"Will your knee be alright?"

"Yeah, definitely."

"Okay."

Surely, she was going to be late to class, and as she checked a clock in the room, she confirmed that, so she told him goodbye, thanked him for the chocolate, felt her voice go high-pitched with the concept of it all. A boy, taking her to an art museum. A boy, paying for her lunch. Was that a date? She wasn't sure of what a date could even be, but whatever it was, he wanted to take her to a museum. It was probably just friendly, wasn't it?

But it seemed less friendly when, as she left the gymnasium's building, she realized that he'd strained his knee trying to impress her.


End file.
